San Francisco Ð President Clinton and his administration aren't the only ones making health care a priority.
Four months after NeXT CEO Steve Jobs delivered the keynote address at a major health-care gathering Ð the HIMSS Conference and Exhibition Ð NeXT sponsored for the second year a one-day health-care developers' symposium, which drew representatives from more than 45 developers and health-care organizations eager to examine NEXTSTEP's status in the health-care marketplace.
Held at NeXTWORLD Expo, the symposium was designed to "build a community focused on health-care solutions within the NeXT developer community," said Ken Rosen, NeXT's manager of emerging markets. "Health care is one of our two major focuses, along with financial services. Today, you actually have vendors who are able to sell solutions and hospitals using NEXTSTEP technology."
Health-care customers with NeXT technology up and running include Mt. Clements General Hospital in Detroit and the Alberta Children's Hospital in Calgary, which is using Montreal-based Logibec Groupe Informatique's Clinibase 2000 application. The Arkansas Children's Hospital is also preparing to make an investment in NeXT, Rosen said.
NeXT developers were enthusiastic about both NeXT's and customer interest in this emerging market. "I was surprised to see the level of support in the health-care community for NEXTSTEP," said Alex Cone, founder and president of New York-based Objective Technologies and one of the symposium speakers. "We've spent a lot of time in the financial community and we're used to people who make thousand-unit commitments. It's nice to see another area with this kind of interest."