At the forefront| Oracle's huge acquisition of Cerner and its entry into healthcare

Wen | Zhang Jingyi

Editor| Su Jianxun

Oracle is entering the market's largest and fastest-growing vertical.

On Dec. 21, database giant Oracle announced the acquisition of electronic medical record firm Cerner for $28.3 billion.

"Oracle and Cerner jointly announced today an agreement to acquire Cerner in an all-cash offer of $95 per share, with an equity valued at approximately $28.3 billion," Oracle said in the announcement. ”

Oracle (ORCL. US) announces acquisition of electronic medical records company Cerner (CERN. US)

This means that Oracle, which has been leading the way in the database space, is about to enter the vertical market of healthcare.

As Oracle expands Cerner's business globally, Oracle expects Cerner to become the company's "huge revenue growth engine for the coming years."

Larry Ellison, Chairman and Chief Technology Officer of Oracle, said: "By working together, Cerner and Oracle have the ability to transform healthcare services by providing better information to medical professionals, enabling them to make better treatment decisions that lead to better outcomes for patients. ”

As a giant in the U.S. healthcare informatization industry, Cerner has more than 40 years of experience in modernizing electronic health records, improving the experience of healthcare workers, and simplifying and automating clinical and job management processes. The acquisition of Cerner may help Oracle gain a foothold in the healthcare industry.

In fact, Oracle has long had a layout in the medical industry. As early as 2007, Oracle listed the life sciences and medical industry as one of the five key support industries; in 2011, Oracle launched a medical insurance transaction solution; in 2017, Oracle began to explore the possibilities of "hospital on the cloud" to try to provide regional medical big data cloud service solutions; in 2018, Oracle acquired health technology startup goBalto to expand its health science business unit.

Oracle is not the only one who sees great potential in the medical industry. In April, Microsoft announced that it would acquire Nuance Communications, a company that already provides transcription technology to 77 percent of U.S. hospitals, for $56 per share. The deal is worth about $16 billion, including debt, for a total value of about $19 billion.

What can be seen is that due to the impact of the new crown epidemic, the medical industry has ushered in new growth space, and data has become an important participating factor in the medical and health industry. According to IDC's 2021 Global Health Industry Forecast Survey, by the end of 2021, 7 of the 10 industry-leading wrist-worn wearables companies will have released algorithms that can detect potential signs of infectious diseases, including covid-19 and influenza, early on. By 2024, the surge in data will result in 60% of healthcare organizations' IT infrastructure being built on data platforms that will use AI to improve process automation and decision-making.

Therefore, this time Oracle has invested heavily in the medical field, and it is obviously ready to enter the game. For the healthcare industry, the involvement of cloud computing and databases means that cloud-based medical solutions can provide huge storage resources through on-demand access, which will be a disruptive innovation for traditional healthcare systems.

Nowadays, the field of medical informatization and data is vast, AI technology and big data cloud computing will continue to drive the innovation of the medical industry chain, for the giants in this field, competition or will intensify, the good drama will soon begin.