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This week’s news of Google’s intent to acquire Motorola Mobility has led some to wonder whether Google might be setting itself up for a second chance to take a crack at the lucrative healthcare market, now that it appears that it intends to become a full-blown hardware competitor in the mobile device market.
Certainly, while Google’s most recent foray into the healthcare market met with disastrous results (the company closed Google Health due to lack of consumer interest), Google now has a chance to revive its fortunes by gaining greater access to Motorola’s healthcare clients that already use products like the MC55A0-HC and the MC75A0-HC, which are handheld devices that Motorola designed specifically for use by doctors, nurses and other employees in the healthcare sector.
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Just last week, technology research firm ABI Research cited Motorola as one of three leading Wi-Fi infrastructure vendors focused on the potential for Wi-Fi in healthcare, and said Motorola stands to benefit from the expansion of existing networks and the increased adoption of Wi-Fi both in the U.S and around the world. The research firm estimates that the market for Wi-Fi access point hardware, software, and services will increase to $1.3 billion by 2016.
Given the plethora of opportunities burgeoning in the healthcare sector, which increasingly calls for robust and secure Internet connections and mobile devices that can access, update, and exchange data as well as provide remote patient monitoring, it’s natural to think that Google might be eyeing opportunities in healthcare.
“Mobility and connectivity are driving new technology adoption in healthcare both in professional and in remote and home care locations,” Jonathan Collins, ABI Research’s principal analyst covering wireless healthcare and M2M, told InformationWeek Healthcare. “A Google/Motorola combination brings together two key gateway devices–home set top boxes and mobile handsets–necessary for an emerging generation of wearable sensors. In addition, there is the ability to drive application and connectivity support in handsets through Android that can support and integrate wearable wireless sensor monitoring and related online applications.”
ABI Research estimates that the number of smartphone and handheld computing devices leveraging professional healthcare Wi-Fi networks to grow by close to 20% in 2011.
The key to grabbing opportunities in the nascent wireless device healthcare market, Collins asserts, is to grow acceptance and then focus on market share. “Google is also well placed to leverage its current online and mobile presence to drive acceptance of wireless within healthcare and I am sure it will do so,” Collins predicts.
Irene Berlinsky, IDC’s senior research analyst covering multiplay services, said that with a Google/Motorola Mobility deal it’s possible that in the future Google might take a closer look at healthcare.
“Google now has a new ‘in’ to the healthcare industry. The question is, will it choose to pursue it,” Berlinsky said in an interview. “The iPad example shows just how unpredictable it is to break into healthcare. Apple almost certainly did not set out to create a healthcare device. The iPad’s rise in hospitals is a direct result of its wild popularity with consumers. Google is at its core a consumer-centric company and so would do well to draw lessons from Apple for its healthcare roadmap, if it still has one.”
Collins said there are other headwinds that Google might face if it decides to develop a go-to-market strategy in healthcare. One is the healthcare industry’s low awareness of the potential of new devices and applications in healthcare management. Other hurdles technology vendors face is the problem of releasing products into a highly regulated market where use cases and regulations often can vary from country to country, and a fragmented supply chain to bring offerings to customers.
On the other hand, “there is real immediate potential within the less-regulated consumer well-being and sports applications and devices market,” Collins observes. “Linking these through a Google managed online presence or online activity and also through gateways such as Android or set top boxes would be a good starting point to drive consumer awareness and uptake.”
Find out how health IT leaders are dealing with the industry’s pain points, from allowing unfettered patient data access to sharing electronic records. Also in the new, all-digital issue of InformationWeek Healthcare: There needs to be better e-communication between technologists and clinicians. Download the issue now. (Free registration required.)
Article source: http://www.informationweek.com/news/healthcare/mobile-wireless/231500316