Cognizant Ranks Fifth on the 2015 Healthcare Informatics 100

OREANDA-NEWS. In its 2015 annual listing of the Top 100 healthcare information technology companies, Healthcare Informatics magazine placed Cognizant at number 5. Cognizant had ranked sixth in 2014. Cognizant’s ranking marks the 14^th consecutive year the company has appeared on the list.

Every year Healthcare Informatics ranks the 100 vendors with the highest revenues derived from healthcare IT products and services earned in the U.S. based on revenue information from the previous year.

In addition, Cognizant has also been named one of four “Most Interesting Vendors” from among the companies that made the list. 

“It’s not as though no one was paying attention to the Teaneck, N.J.-based Cognizant before September 2014,” the magazine writes. “After all, the company had already been making waves as a provider of IT services across many industries, with an already-significant presence in the health insurance world. Still, the announcement that Cognizant…was acquiring the Englewood, Colo.-based TriZetto for $2.7 billion in cash was seen as some in the industry as a harbinger of things to come, as the concepts of managed care, population health, and accountable care, begin to blend together, with health insurers and providers collaborating to manage patient’s care, and as providers take on more financial risk, in the broad effort to improve outcomes and cut costs in U.S. healthcare.”

Krish Venkat, President of Healthcare and Life Sciences at Cognizant, says the acquisition of TriZetto fits in perfectly with the company’s broader trajectory. “What Cognizant is trying to do is obviously synchronize to where we believe the industry is heading, and where the various participants in the healthcare ecosystem are making their moves,” he says. “When you look at changes in the Affordable Care Act, they’re forcing many changes: the lines are blurring between payers and providers; a lot of consolidation is occurring; a lot of providers are taking on more risk to fully become health systems; and there’s a lot of consolidation on the payer side as well.”

Venkat says that while Cognizant was already all in, in terms of the provision of IT services for health insurers,  “one of the things we didn’t have in our repertoire, as late as last year—one aspect we see emerging, and we didn’t have the full suite of product offerings—when we look at large and small customers and those in between, we look at the challenges we have in terms of what is imposed on them under the ACA [Affordable Care Act], in terms of the administrative costs and medical loss ratios. And many health plans are operating with dated technologies—and they have a smaller footprint, and want to have the support of somebody with a much larger challenge.”

Going forward, Venkat sees two very broad areas of opportunity for the company. “One area is with provider organizations, as they take on greater risk and develop accountable care and population health initiatives,” he says. “Population health is certainly one area where we’ve developed a solution, and we’re integrating that with the TriZetto platform.” The other broad area of opportunity, he says, is in what he calls “consumerism”—the broad range of health plan member engagement possibilities around “improving consumers’ ability to select plans,” and to better manage their interactions with health plans.

The magazine adds that industry observers see Cognizant’s trajectory, post-TriZetto-acquisition, as one offers great opportunity for the company.

Ben Rooks, an industry analyst and observer who heads up the ST Advisors consulting firm based in Northern California, says, “Cognizant has a great asset in that they are providing services to probably nine out of the top ten payers. Traditionally, the services were outsourcing services…It was a very smart move; and now they’re one of the very dominant payer services companies. They’ve got services and they’ve got product; they’re positioned to be one of the top players in the space.” He adds, “The biggest opportunity is that they really can provide a 360-degree solution to their health plan customers. And the nature of a health plan is becoming more blurry.”

“I do think it’s a very interesting company, just because of the depth of skill involved; and it’s a very large company,” says Lee Marley, Senior Vice President and CIO at the eight-hospital Presbyterian Health Services in Albuquerque. “And,” she adds, “with the acquisition of TriZetto, that really does make them very interesting to watch.” She describes her organization’s relationship with Cognizant as “a very long-standing, successful” one.