GE Healthcare plans to invest $2 billion over the next five years to accelerate the development of innovative software for healthcare systems and applications.

The investment is designed to advance current and future offerings in order to address new and pressing operational and productivity challenges faced by healthcare organizations around the world, executives announced June 11 in a news release. GE Healthcare will work closely with the GE Software Center of Excellence in San Ramon, Calif. – as well as at various research and development hubs around the world – to develop new software solutions.

As the largest software developer within GE, GE Healthcare provides a wide range of medical imaging technologies, IT services, patient monitoring and diagnostic solutions, biopharmaceutical manufacturing technologies and operational and technological service solutions. Specifically, this $2 billion investment will be focused on maximizing asset performance; improving hospital operations management; improving clinical effectiveness; and optimizing care across entire populations.

Key focus areas include:

• Caring for more patients as a result of scheduling efficiencies, faster data entry, proactive asset management, clinical decision support and financial gains that allow for expansion.
• Reducing costs by optimizing workflow in care delivery, minimizing payment cycles, maximizing reimbursement rates and eliminating unnecessary waste.
• Minimizing rework and redundancies by enhancing collaboration and making patient information universally accessible.

“GE is investing in software and analytics to better help our customers manage the operational complexity of the healthcare system,” John Dineen, president and CEO, GE Healthcare, said in a statement. “These new software solutions will look to connect caregivers in a meaningful way to the systems upon which they rely, enabling them to deliver better informed diagnoses and improved care."

[See also: Microsoft and GE Healthcare get regulatory approval to form Caradigm.]

“Healthcare has always relied on ’big data,’ and the need to understand data is even greater now,” Dineen said. “What is important is how we use data, “providing the right technology that allows physicians to pinpoint the right diagnosis; match it to the right treatment; and make more informed decisions.”

[See also: GE Healthcare Launches Centricity Imaging IT Tour.]

GE Healthcare executives say they will leverage the Industrial Internet, which they define as the convergence of machine and intelligent data.

“The Industrial Internet is changing the way healthcare professionals work and GE Healthcare has already made big strides in developing software-based technologies and solutions that provide increased data, analytics, connectivity and insight into operational and departmental processes and workflows,” executives said in a statement. “Together, with the help of industry partners, GE Healthcare’s 3000+ software engineers and GE’s software Centers of Excellence across the globe, GE will provide flexible and connected software, data and analytics so caregivers have what they need to help prevent, diagnose, treat and cure new health challenges they face every day. As the industry shifts towards accountable and integrated care, faster, more accurate real-time information has never been more important.”