Wireless Home Healthcare to be $4 Billion Industry by 2013

Mobile carriers to open new market opportunities in healthcare with wireless technologies

The U.S. market for wireless home-based healthcare applications and services will grow at a five-year cumulative annual growth rate of over 80% and become a $4.4 billion industry in 2013, according to Wireless Healthcare: Analysis & Forecasts.

The report from international research firm Parks Associates predicts the push for healthcare reform from the Obama Administration will ultimately boost adoption of wireless technologies in healthcare. The Federal Government is committed to promoting technology that improves healthcare efficiency, evident in the stimulus funds already allocated to electronic medical records (EMR) adoption, and this focus will open new long-term opportunities for wireless providers.

Parks Associates finds wireless technologies can benefit home care in areas such as chronic care management, medical diagnostic device monitoring, wellness and fitness applications, medication management, and senior independent living solutions.

The report suggests that mobile carriers will leverage their network resources to target vertical markets like healthcare through both wholesale and retail partnerships. Deals such as recent agreements from Verizon Wireless with LifeWatch and Qualcomm will become more commonplace as this market moves into wider availability.

Wireless Healthcare: Analysis and Forecasts analyzes how mobile and wireless networking technologies can transform personal health applications and highlights market opportunities for businesses in the global mobile healthcare market.

For the full press release, click here.

Over Eight Million Smart Meters Deployed in U.S., with Millions More to Come

Report profiles key players in Residential Energy Management, analyzes new opportunities for companies in the Smart Grid value chain--

With over eight million smart meters already deployed in the U.S., the market for residential energy management (REM) has taken the first significant steps in deploying Smart Grid technologies and advanced meter infrastructure (AMI) on a broad scale.

The recently completed report, Residential Energy Management: Company, Alliance & Technology Profiles, says these deployments will open up significant opportunities for companies in the REM value chain. Public, private, and consumer factors are all driving this growth, and the Federal stimulus bill, with the support of the Obama Administration, allocates $11 billion for smart grid initiatives through 2010.

Residential Energy Management: Company, Alliance & Technology Profiles provides coverage of more than 60 companies and ten alliances, including Home Area Network (HAN) solutions and component suppliers; metering solutions manufacturers; Smart Grid enablers; and technology enablers.

This report is the first deliverable in Parks Associates’ comprehensive industry and consumer research service called Residential Energy Management: Opportunities for Digital Systems and Services.

For the full press release, visit click here.

Parks Associates forecasts over 640 million broadband households worldwide by 2013

Value-added services, stimulus funds will help increase subscriber numbers --

The demand for high-bandwidth applications will jump in the next few years as the number of households worldwide with broadband will reach close to 650 million by 2013, according to international research firm Parks Associates. The firm’s new report Broadband Services: Global Outlook warns that service providers will have to continue investing in network technologies to accommodate multiple services such as video-on-demand and converging social-networking applications.

Parks Associates reports the number of broadband households worldwide grew by over 18% in 2008 to exceed 400 million. Asia-Pacific is the largest market, accounting for over 160 million subscribers, and it will have over 49% of the global market share by 2013.

In the U.S., the federal government, at the request of the Obama Administration, will soon release billions of dollars from the stimulus package to promote expansion of affordable high-speed Internet services in rural areas, which will open new areas in this country to advanced online services.

Bandwidth will continue to be a focus as the operators re-architect their networks to deliver multiple services over the same infrastructure; however, in such a competitive field, bandwidth alone is not enough to win subscribers. Blended applications, combining services such as online video and customer support, offer operators an opportunity to increase ARPU. In addition, innovative new services will help differentiate service providers, which can then compete on factors beyond pricing or raw bandwidth.

For the full press release, click here.

Personal Health Technology Spending to Exceed $460 Million in the Disease Management Sector in 2013

Competitive pressure and congressional stimulus funds drive adoption--Providers of personal health technologies such as health monitoring devices and personal health records (PHR) can generate over $460 million in revenue in 2013 by targeting the disease management (DM) industry, according to Parks Associates’ recent report Disease Management Industry and High-Tech Adoption. The international research firm cites changes in the healthcare landscape, combined with the Obama administration’s stimulus package and reform initiatives, as catalysts for accelerated technology spending over the next five years.

Technology vendors that are familiar with the unique characteristics of the DM business and can show the clear and immediate benefits of their solution within this context will be in the best position to win these contracts.

Disease Management Industry and High-Tech Adoption is Parks Associates’ latest research report about the future of the disease management industry. It highlights challenges and opportunities and discusses technology’s role in driving innovations in new care management models.

Obama’s Commitment to Electronic Medical Records (EMR) is Ambitious

Last week, President-elect Barack Obama openly pledged to computerize the nation’s medical records in five years. The promise is ambitious, as I remembered talks about computerized medical records dated as far back as in 1999. Will Obama accomplish this goal?

The first barrier is himself and his administration. I am impressed with his resolve and courage to take on this issue in his first year. But the reality is that the economic recovery is the national priority and if he has too broad an agenda in the first year, he might lose the focus and underachieve on the main goal. This could negatively impact his support from the grassroots up to the Congress, making his future tasks difficult to accomplish. Will this consequence shake his confidence and commitment levels? It remains to be seen.

The second challenge is clearly on the financial side. EMR is not simply a database but the brain of a modernized healthcare system. It reminds me of the SAP-type of ERP systems adopted by America’s largest multinational corporations (try asking any ERP adopters of their experience and see what they say privately). Since its functions touch every aspect of a healthcare system, it does not come cheap given the fact that it will be implemented at the national level. Industry pundits estimate that the cost of computerizing medical record systems can be anywhere between $70 billion to $100 billion. Will federal government have that amount of money in the first place given all the budget deficits and a traumatized economy? Even if it does, how to ensure that this money will be appropriated correctly and not siphoned off for other purposes? We all know that government accountability standard is quite weak. Even with the appointment of the Chief Performance Officer in the Obama administration, many doubt the effectiveness of such a position. Finally, the actual cost can be much higher, which can be caused by the third barrier—implementation.

The healthcare industry is considered one of the most challenging environments for healthcare IT implementation. Not only is it big, but it is complex and extremely fragmented. The first ten years of Internet did not help much, only exacerbating the situation by adding non-standard based, proprietary IT systems on top of the legacy ones that the healthcare facilities inherited from the 70’s and 80’s. The most daunting task is to make each system talk to one another in the same language. Using a more official term, it is called interoperability or more accurately, the lack of it. Do not underestimate the challenge here. The Bush administration created the Office of the National Coordinator of Health Information Technology in his first term (May 2004). After five years, the interoperability standards are still in debate and only a few are adopted in a piecemeal fashion.

I cited these barriers in a bid to lower people’s rosy expectation on Obama’s plan. We need to have a sober recognition of the challenges and advise the incoming administration of the lessons we learned over the last eight years. The five-year plan is good for rallying the industry, but when it comes to the time to roll up your sleeves, a more pragmatic approach should be adopted. President Obama: I would like to see your implementation timetable and approach first before I can agree with your ambition.