Blockchain deployment not matching the hype–so far. 34% of CIOs have ‘no interest’.

May 10, 2018 | by

A Gartner study confirms blockchain’s Peak of Inflated Expectations position on the Hype Curve. Despite all the chatter, blockchain isn’t being deployed in a commensurate way. Among over 3,100 CIOs surveyed, only 1 percent reported “any kind of blockchain adoption” in their organization. On the other hand, 34 percent have ‘no interest.’ 8 percent said they were conducting short-term testing with blockchain, 14 percent had graduated to medium or long-term planning, and 43 percent said it was on the radar, but they had no plans to test or develop or deploy it. A major reason is a dearth of skills; 23 percent said the effort requires the “most new skills to implement” of any IT tool.

But spending on blockchain technology is geometrically increasing: estimates for 2018 are $2.1 bn, a 122 percent increase over 2017’s $945 million. More information in Gartner’s press release and blockchain page. Also Angus Loten in The Wall Street Journal.

As our Editor in Chief Emeritus Steve Hards explained in his recent must-read article on blockchain, especially in healthcare, “distributed ledger technologies are not just in their infancy, they are still at a baby stage. Many are still gestating. It may be worth waiting to see which ones thrive.” In healthcare, we have a far greater problem with interoperability and secure data exchange which blockchain can only partially address. 

Do startups truly threaten the ‘healthcare establishment’?

May 19, 2015 | by

Or are successful startups fitting into their game? Chris Seper in MedCityNews paints the picture of one side of a quandary. The ‘healthcare establishment’ fundamentally and to its detriment does not understand and is threatened by the startup and innovation process. A startup may begin with an idea which is, in his words, ‘almost always flawed, sometimes deeply’. If the founders are smart, they will test their ideas, validate them and change them appropriately. If not, they will fail. But it is easier for the Establishment to point at the most egregious of the bad ideas and use them to rationalize the status quo.

But being congenital contrarians, we paint the house on the other side of the street. Has the Establishment caught up with–or in some cases, co-opted startups, making them and their funders ‘do their diligence’ and be more cautious before emerging? This Editor would argue yes, and largely for the better.

**The ‘Wild West’ days are over. A few years ago, a truly bad or deeply flawed health tech idea or could easily find funding, because it was all blank slate, new and ‘transformative’.The sexiest hooks were Quantified Self, sleep, employer health incentives, interactive coaching, genomics, app prescribing and (last) wearables. A lot of founders imagined themselves as the Steve Jobs of Healthcare, down to the black turtleneck. Now there is a history of success and failure. The railroads reached the dusty frontier towns.

**There’s now a ‘Startup Establishment’. National accelerators (more…)

It’s official! mHealth in the ‘trough of disillusionment’

August 28, 2014 | by | 4 Comments

Gartner annually issues its Hype Cycle for Emerging Technologies in the Dog Days of August, perhaps not to burst too many bubbles, derail too many fundings?

  • Lo and behold, ‘mobile health monitoring ‘ is heading towards the bottom of the Trough of Disillusionment. Moreover, its recovery is projected at 5-10 years to move out of the Trough, whip through the Slope of Enlightenment and enter the sunny uplands of the Plateau of Productivity. See Gartner chart below.

mHealth Summit 2013: Sunday Venture+ Forum

December 10, 2013 | by

Lois Drapin, Founder & CEO of The Drapin Group, provides a recap of the Venture+ Forum held the day before the official start of the mHealth Summit 2013. This is the first of her dispatches, courtesy of HIT Consultant.

[grow_thumb image=”https://telecareaware.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/mooc1.png” thumb_width=”150″ /]Yes, it’s true. Sunday’s Venture+ Forum, one of the day-long events that takes place before the official start of the mHealth Summit 2013, was a lot like living Gartner’s Hype Cycle in one day. Before I tell you why, let me first offer my sincere apologies to Gartner Inc. (I’ll reference the Gartner methodology in underlined italics). Absolutely no offense is meant, but this borrowed framework could be the assist I need at 1 a.m. to offer up my POV.

Keynote Speaker: Jack Young, Director of Qualcomm Ventures

The day began with Jack Young, Director of Qualcomm Ventures and head of the Qualcomm Life Fund. He talked about trends that we should all know by now— the rising costs of healthcare (at $8K per human per capita, health is the most expensive subscription in our home); the aging population (a company in Japan reported that it had sold more adult diapers than baby diapers this past year). Qualcomm sees the Technology Trigger in the emergence of wearables or “mini working computers” and with big data in health such as claims data, EMR data, genomic data, consumer and social data. The wearables industry is emerging, having come into our lives connected to our smartphones. In this way, if you will, our social-ness is changing too. When you wear a wearable (watch, glasses, shoe, shirt, pin—whatever item(s) we choose), we are more likely to accept that “I’m on the journey” to health, wellness and well-being. We’re involving our friends, families and co-workers. The data that is, or will be coming from our use of wearables and other sources, will give us meaningful insights that can change behavior and health outcomes. It sounds a bit like ‘Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds’, yet who doesn’t love an investor with ‘California Dreamin’’ on his mind. I know I do.

But I already could feel the climb toward the Peak of Inflated Expectations. It really didn’t seem too far away or too high up. (more…)