Misys Healthcare has been beset with a number of problems lately, many of which have been covered in Lab Soft News. In January, the company's CEO, Tom Skelton, resigned in the wake of "unacceptable" performance. The company's U.S. headquarters are located in Raleigh, North Carolina. We now learn from a Raleigh business publication that these events and the Misys retrenchment plans are roiling the local real estate market (see: Misys' Forum space could hit market) Below is an excerpt from the article (boldface emphasis mine):
A management shakeup that's roiling Misys Healthcare's headquarters in north Raleigh may send tremors through the commercial real estate market surrounding it. Misys Healthcare in December 2005 signed a binding pre-lease agreement for 60,000 square feet of office space that spurred construction of the new Forum V building ...But sources now say Misys has started quietly marketing the Forum V space to other companies for sublease because Misys will no longer need it when the building....Millions of dollars are at stake for Misys Healthcare's bottom line. The deal the division signed in 2005 is valued at $63.5 million over 10 years and ranked as the second largest office lease of the year....Skelton was replaced in February by former Kodak executive Roger Davenport. On March 8, Misys CEO Mike Lawrie announced a new strategy for the company that includes more focus in health care on its physicians practices, consolidation of its software development operations around the world, the sale of its Sesame division and a cost restructuring expected to improve its financial margin....Misys Healthcare, a health-care software and services company, has about 800 of its 2,800 worldwide employees based in The Forum office park.
The ramifications of the above reference to more focus on its physician practices is not entirely clear. For example, its Optimum product was described by the company in the following way in 2004 (see: Misys introduces Misys Optimum to support physicians and caregivers across the continuum of care)
Misys Optimum is a comprehensive suite of world-class clinical systems and services uniquely positioned to support community-wide health care with data sharing among acute, ambulatory and post-acute care providers, affiliated and non-affiliated. Approximately 92.000 physicians and more than 100.000 nurses in 18.000 medical practice locations, 1200 hospitals and 600 home care organisations across North America rely on Misys solutions to improve organisational efficiencies and overall productivity.
Misys first arrive in Raleigh, North Carolina, in late 1997 with the $923 million purchase of Medic Computer Systems. Medic was a physician office practice management system (PMS). It appeared to me at that time that the Misys strategy was to provide software for both healthcare systems and the physician office market. However, providing support across the entire "continuum of care" is a rather tall order, particularly for a company experiencing both leadership and financial challenges. Moreover, the hospital and the physician office are quite different healthcare software markets. It's possible, therefore, that such a goal is unrealistic. However, once it has been publicized, how does one back off from it gracefully and which of its existing product lines does the company then favor? I suspect that answer can derived from the financial success in the market of its various offerings.
Update on 3/29/2007 at 12:38 p.m.
Also see Misys' focus is back on doctors.
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