Quadrant4 Systems Banking on Healthcare Reform

Quadrant4 Systems has announced the development of a cloud-based health insurance exchange platform designed to assist states and other enterprises as they prepare for the health insurance exchanges that must be in place by 2014. Because many states are in the final stages of acquiring bids to develop, participate and operate these exchanges according to federal guidelines, Quadrant4 wants to cash in on what it sees as a vibrant economic opportunity.

“Through this platform, Quadrant4's addressable market, just in exchange space for the software development opportunity alone, would run into at least $5 million per State,” said Dr. Nandu Thondavadi, CEO of Quadrant 4, “and every dollar spent on software development would lead into at least $5 in recurring managed services revenues. This will be a very substantial market for our company to be in, which should eventually make us a standout in the industry through our healthcare practice.” Shares of Quadrant4 stock rose five percent on the announcement of the development.

Health insurance exchanges are new organizations designed to help consumers more easily find health insurance coverage and to more thoroughly understand their options. At their inception in 2014, these exchanges will serve mostly individuals as well as small businesses that have fewer than 100 employees. In the future, these exchanges will most likely include larger employers as well.

By putting healthcare data in the cloud, states will guarantee that healthcare information, whether the information is related to the exchanges or to electronic health records, is always available. The scalability of the cloud also provides massive advantages to governments as they set up healthcare exchanges. In addition, data aggregated in the cloud can be analyzed more easily on a large scale. As a result, healthcare reform creates a great opportunity for cloud and managed hosting companies to cash in by developing innovative solutions.

“There is a tremendous opportunity to introduce advanced Information Technology in healthcare infrastructure to help control costs while improving the quality of healthcare,” Dhru Desai, chairman of Quadrant4, commented in a press release. “Quadrant4's Health Insurance Exchange platform architecture is based on [an] advanced technology stack that the company has been developing over last six months and represents a true convergence of Cloud Computing, Mobility Solutions and a Social Media based tool set.”