Reddit Users Comment on Epic Losing the DoD EHR Contract to Cerner

The reactions to Epic losing the DoD EHR contract to Cerner have been all over the place. Most of them create some simplified view of why Epic beat out Cerner. I personally think that Leidos vs IBM had a lot more to do with the DoD’s decision than Epic vs Cerner. Either way, HIStalk reported that the protest period for the DoD EHR bid has expired and so Cerner is the big EHR winner. Mr. H said that rumors have been that Cerner’s bid was $1 billion less than Epic and Allscripts and so that’s why there was no protest.

Personally, I’ve been most fascinated by the reactions to Cerner beating out Epic in this reddit thread that includes a number of current and former Epic employees. The person who started the thread conveyed many people’s reaction to the selection of Cerner over Epic:

RIP my contracting plans for the next 2+ years 🙁

No doubt, Cerner consultants are celebrating in the opposite direction along with the 30+ other partners that won the bid with Leidos, Cerner, and Accenture. I previously wrote about how many people will be required in the $4 billion DoD EHR contract.

Here are some of the other interesting reactions in the reddit thread linked above:

I don’t think this is that bad for Epic.
* The government contract likely would have significantly shifted the focus of R&D efforts for the next few years towards features that may not be in the best interest of other Epic customers.
* When the project invariably runs into issues: overbudget, overtime, stability, training, response time, upgrades, etc. Cerner will be on the hook and take the hits in the media. Much of this implementation will be handled by outside consultants so coordination will be a huge challenge for any company.

Reminds me of the post I wrote about a year ago suggesting that losing the DoD bid might be the best thing for Epic.

Some source claim the contract would have been worth $9 billion overall. Just to put that in perspective… For an Epic employee making $200k a year, $9bn would pay your salary for 45 THOUSAND years. For 5,000 employees each making $200k a year, $9bn would pay their salaries for nine years.

(Yes, I know its not that simple… just trying to put $9 billion dollars in some kind of perspective).

Point is, yes, gaining or loosing a contract for that kind of money is a very big deal for ANY company, and impacts the future of that company in a significant way.

I don’t think most of us can comprehend a billion dollars. I know I can’t. However, I agree with the point that losing the DoD EHR contract is a big deal for any company. Even with this other clarification about how much money the EHR vendor will get from the contract:

I saw estimates that the contract would be worth $9 billion over 18 years, and that Cerner was likely to get only 10-20% of it (with most of the money going to Leidos). That means Cerner is getting $50-$100 million per year. This is obviously substantial, but it’s not as impressive as the $9 billion sounds.

I’ll be interested to see if those estimates are accurate. Plus, we’ll see how much the project cost balloons over time.

This Epic employee offered an interesting concern over Epic losing the DoD contract:

As a current Epic employee, I’m more than a little concerned about how much of the current building projects and massive hiring was made under the hope/assumption that we would be awarded this contract. I think this represents a much bigger deal for Epic than what you try to wave off.

Another user offered this comment on why Epic might have lost the deal:

What everyone needs to consider is that Epic is currently working on the build for United States Coast Guard (USCG). 1.The USCG falls under the DoD in terms of rules of engagement to include use of CHCS and PGUI (USCG didn’t transition to ALHTA). 2. The Epic build is consider by most involved on this project as an Epic failure! 3. DoD know about this Epic failure and of course the decision to to choose Epic is based upon this build failure. 4. After five years of this USCG contract Epic is still trying to understand military processes.

However, I think this was the feeling for many and why many are still in shock that Cerner won the contract over Epic:

Wow, I thought Epic had that contract locked up.

Just like I’ve done with ICD-10, I chose not to try and predict what the government will do. So, I wasn’t personally surprised by the DoD picking Cerner over Epic. However, now that Cerner is chosen, I’m interested to see how this affects both companies. The last comment about Epic’s USCG implementation illustrates how challenging working with the government can be. Cerner will definitely be spending time developing some unique software and technology to meet the DoD’s unique needs.

About the author

John Lynn

John Lynn is the Founder of HealthcareScene.com, a network of leading Healthcare IT resources. The flagship blog, Healthcare IT Today, contains over 13,000 articles with over half of the articles written by John. These EMR and Healthcare IT related articles have been viewed over 20 million times.

John manages Healthcare IT Central, the leading career Health IT job board. He also organizes the first of its kind conference and community focused on healthcare marketing, Healthcare and IT Marketing Conference, and a healthcare IT conference, EXPO.health, focused on practical healthcare IT innovation. John is an advisor to multiple healthcare IT companies. John is highly involved in social media, and in addition to his blogs can be found on Twitter: @techguy.

   

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