A Minor Acquisition
Richmond, Va.-based Owens & Minor — a provider of medical and surgical supplies and a healthcare supply chain management company — has completed its acquisition of certain assets of the acute-care medical and surgical supply distribution business of McKesson Medical-Surgical, a business unit of McKesson Corporation (Alpharetta, Ga.).
Owens & Minor acquired the business for approximately $165 million.
Owens & Minor and McKesson have launched a cooperative transition plan designed to convert the McKesson business to Owens & Minor over an estimated six-month period, according to the companies. Under this agreement, Owens & Minor will compensate McKesson for providing distribution and support services to customers until the customers are converted to Owens & Minor.
CareSpark RHIO Collaborates and Lights-Up Scene
Kingsport, Tenn.'s CareSpark Appalachian RHIO has joined forces with numerous national and local technology companies to form the CareSpark RHIO Consortium.
To create the necessary technical infrastructure, the CareSpark RHIO Consortium has enlisted companies such as ActiveHealth Management, AllScripts, CGI-AMS, Cisco Systems, Dell, GE Healthcare, Intel, Initiate Systems, Misys, Quovadx, Oracle and Siemens Medical Solutions to help.
CareSpark is a nonprofit organization established in 2005 to develop and implement a collaborative system for health improvements in a 17-county central Appalachian region of northeast Tennessee and southwest Virginia. The consortium will assist in the development of a technical infrastructure for the secure exchange of health information among physicians, hospitals, clinics and other healthcare providers in that region.
TriZetto Buying QCSI
The TriZetto Group Inc. (Newport Beach, Calif.) is acquiring privately held QCSI (Quality Care Solutions Inc.), bringing together two providers of information technology solutions for the healthcare payer industry.
Together, the companies will focus on real-time point-of-service transaction capabilities and personal health records. TriZetto stated that it will continue supporting Phoenix-based QCSI's QNXT software system alongside its existing enterprise administration solutions.
The transaction is expected to close during the fourth quarter, at which time TriZetto expects to pay $133 million net of cash, and assume $1.2 million of debt.
Motorola Makes a Mobile Symbol
In an effort to deliver seamless mobility solutions, Schaumburg, Ill.-based Motorola, Inc., has signed a merger agreement with Holtsville, N.Y.-headquartered Symbol Technologies, Inc.
Motorola will get all outstanding shares of Symbol for $15-per-share in cash. The transaction has a total equity value of approximately $3.9 billion. Upon completion of the transaction, Symbol will become a wholly owned subsidiary of Motorola.
Motorola adds Symbol's designs, developed and manufactured products and systems used in end-to-end enterprise mobility solutions. The company features mobile computing, advanced data capture, radio frequency identification, wireless infrastructure and mobility management.
Accuro Snaps Up CDMSG
Dallas-based Accuro Healthcare Solutions Inc., has acquired CDM Services Group Inc. (CDMSG), which provides chargemaster consulting and maintenance services to more than 70 hospitals.
CDMSG will be combined with Accuro's existing suite of chargemaster and coding application solutions.
The acquisition of CDMSG from M. Leco & Associates, a Pittsburgh-based national provider of revenue recovery services for the healthcare industry, expands Accuro's chargemaster management solutions and consulting offerings to hospitals and other healthcare providers nationwide, according to the company.
Terms were not disclosed.
Accenture Taps SAP for Team
Hamilton, Bermuda-headquartered Accenture Ltd., and Newtown Square, Pa.-headquartered SAP Americas Inc., a subsidiary of SAP AG, Germany, have made a deal to co-develop a collaborative health network (CHN) solution. The two have decided to join forces in an effort to help organizations improve patient care by streamlining the way they access, integrate and share information.
Under this agreement, the CHN solution will be based on SAP NetWeaver for controlling healthcare costs and providing an infrastructure to link a range of information and data. The solution's goal is to help organizations maintain electronic health records and to use an enterprise service-oriented architecture.
SAP and Accenture will work together to market, support and service the new solution. The two companies expect the first release of the solution to be available mid-2007.
