When Glen Tullman took the CEO position at Allscripts in 1997, the company was out of money and its business model of being a repackager of medications wasn’t working.
So Tullman sold off the only profitable division of the company and started to transition it into being a provider of electronic prescribing software for doctors. The idea was to equip physicians with electronic tools that would prevent medication errors, making health care both safer and more efficient.
With almost 3 billion prescriptions being written every year, there was a lot of potential business. But Tullman knew he needed more than just software; he also needed technology solutions that would change physicians’ attitudes and behaviors.
He focused on creating a modular Electronic Medical Record, in which physicians could choose what applications they wanted, and made acquisitions along the way to make this possible. The company then introduced the Electronic Health Record, which not only automated physicians, it also connected them to pharmacies, payers and other physicians. Allscripts found a secure way for physicians to connect to patients and introduced iHealth.
Each of these innovations has kept the company ahead of competitors and allowed it to finish 2005 with records in sales, revenues, profits and cash flow from operations.
Tullman says that health care is an information business, and while the company’s current business model is primarily driven by software sales, he expects revenues in the future to be driven by information and transactions, as well.
How to reach: Allscripts, www.allscripts.com