H.I.S.-tory by Vince Ciotti

Episode #68, Keane Part 6:

First Coast & SDS

© 2011 by H.I.S. Professionals, LLC, all rights reserved.

Last of Keane’s Acquired Products• This week we end (finally!) the story of Keane, looking at the last two

vendors/systems they acquired while building “Threshold:”– First Coast – Charlie Gibb’s firm from Florida, whose “APaCS” HIS

offered a full financial/clinical suite on IBM AS/400 minis.– Source Data Systems - (SDS), from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, based on

NCR’s “Mednet” HIS, that ran at over 170 hospitals in the 90s…

• The story of First Coast Systems (FCS) starts with its founder, Charlie Gibbs, whose career started way back in 1964 (whew, I was only a freshman in college back then!) when Charlie was a hospital systems engineer at (where else?) IBM.

• In 1973, Charlie and his wife Donna started their own firm in Jacksonville called Gibbs Computer Systems.

Pilot Hospital Partnership• Following a script played out so often

in the HIS industry, Charlie & Donna partnered with a nearby FLA hospital to build their “APaCS” HIS:– Baptist Medical Center

• Heard that before in HIS-tory? Try:- Lockheed’s MIS at El Camino in CA- IBM’s “HIS” at Monmouth in NJ- McAuto’s HFC at OSF in Illinois- Medipac at Evanston, Illinois- JS Data at South County in RI- Meditech at Cape Cod Hospital- Sentry at Norwegian American- CSC’s Tandem HIS at Long Beach…

What’s an “APaCS?”• Glad you asked! It’s an “Advanced Patient Care System,” which is so

much better than one of those many tired old PCS-es on the market…• And for hardware, the Gibbs made the wise choice of IBM minis,

starting with the 3X series in the late 70s & early 80s (like so many other HIS vendors: JS Data, DCC, AR/Mediquest, etc.), then running on the hot new AS/400 series mini when it was announced in 1988.

• In 1985, Charlie & Donna renamed their firm First Coast Systems (FCS), and grew APaCS from a basic financial suite into a true patient care system, adding Orders & Results, Care Plans & Nurses Notes; even ancillaries like: RIS, OR, RX, etc.

FCS’ Management Team• Charlie took a page out of PHS’ story by

following the “Previously Hired by SMS” formula when he hired a K. of P. hero:– Bob Blades – I remember Bob well

from my SMS days as the ID Manager for the Delaware Valley office. Bob became FCS’ National Marketing Director around 1989, joining:

– Phil Galusha – who had started in 1977 and became Director of Product Development, later promoted to VP.

• Charlie and Donna rounded out the management team:- Charlie as Chief Executive Officer, and Donna as the President.

• Know of any other husband & wife teams in the HIS vendor ranks?- I sure don’t – can anybody out there think of any? Write us!

Sales Successes & Rapid Growth• Being privately held, FCS’s revenue figures were not public

info, but the firm grew rapidly to where by the late 90s, it was approaching $20M in annual revenue with about 100 FTEs.

• Some other trivia from a 25-year-old RFP response back then:– About 100 hospital clients, most with financial systems. But

many growing into APaCS evolving suite of clinicals too..– 8 sales claimed in 1998, 5 new hospital sales in 1997…– No regional offices – all service/support out of the FLA HQ

• (Shades of Meditech, CPSI, & Epic…)– Help Keys customized via FCS’ Knowledge Base Navigator– EDI included E2000 claims manager & Pathways Mat. Man.– The IBM AS/400 9406 Model 720 offered up to 4MB main

memory, while disk storage ran from 128 to 263 Gigabytes, and support 50 current out of 240 users (CRTs & printers).

David Catches the Eye of Goliath…• If Mr. HIS-talk had his blog in 1999, the hot story on Nov 22nd was:

– “Keane Inc. today completed its purchase of Jacksonville's First Coast Systems

– FCS, which provides software for hospitals, is being merged into Keane's health care division, and its Jacksonville office will become a Keane branch.

– First Coast's core product, Advanced Patient Care Delivery System (Apacs), gives medical providers access to patient records at the point of care.

– FCS had $20 million in revenue last year, according to information submitted to The (Jacksonville) Business Journal for a Dec. 3 list of software developers. Keane, a publicly traded company, reported revenue of $1 billion in 1998.

– "Both Keane and First Coast Systems offer high-quality products and services to the health care market, but use different technology to deliver those products, effectively creating two different market solutions," said Raymond W. Paris, vice president of Keane's health care division. "As a result, this is an extremely complementary acquisition, strengthening Keane's position."

– The First Coast purchase was the seventh for Keane in 1999.”

• Charlie & Donna probably made out pretty darn well, considering back then most acquisitions were about equal to annual revenue!

Eventual Dénouement…• FCS clients did pretty well at first, especially with Y2K looming on

the Horizon (HBO pun intended!). Keane sold & supported APaCS well into the mid-2000s, under the name of “Insights” and upgraded to run on IBM’s latest boxes: the i-Series then P-Series.

• At the 2009 HIMSS, Keane announced “Optimum” a combo of the award-winning PHS “PatCom” system featured in last week’s episode, and their self-developed “iMed” clinical suite.

• No mention of FCS or Insights since…

Source Data Systems (SDS)• SDS was founded in 1978 by Bob

Barnett Jr. CEO, and Gary Ford, President, in Cedar Rapids, IA.

• The system ran on NCR minis with NCR’s UNIX-based “MedNet” HIS developed at pilot Mercy Hospital, along with an “InfiNet” repository.

• They eagerly embraced interfacing to standalones in Lab, RX, etc., rather than trying to develop every HIS app.

• Client base grew to ≈170 mostly small hospitals, with ≈125 FTEs and annual revenue to about $11M by the time they were acquired by Keane in 1995.

• Sunset in 1997, just before Y2K…

Mean & Nasty?• Sound mean of Keane to sunset SDS just a few

years before Y2K? Well, they weren’t alone:– SMS sunset “Allegra” (nee Computer Synergy)

in the late 90s when the cost of upgrading it Invision, Novius and Medseries 4 was too much

– I’m sure there were many more products other vendors sunset back in those panic days too!

• So before you shake your head about these poor HIS pioneers who got hurt, just what is your hospitals doing about ICD-10 and Stage 2 of MU?• Does your agreement with your HIS vendor

hold them accountable for complying with these imminent upgrades? Within the time frames mandated?? And at no cost to you???

• Maybe it’s time to check your contract…

Next Week: Not Keane!• Next week we resume our march through today’ HIS vendors: where they

got their systems and how many still run today, with:– QuadraMed – formed from a host of acquisitions, most notably being

Shelly Dorenfest & Ron Apprahamian’s Compucare.– UltiCare – the heart of our story, developed by Ralph Korpman’s Health

Data Sciences corporation from San Bernadino, CA.• Anybody got any info on Ron or Ralph (I’m in touch with Shelly…), please

call (505/466-4958) or write (vciotti@hispros.com)

• And in case you missed any prior episodes of our HIS-tory series (or want to check out where you’re HIS vendor originally got their stuff), just hop on over to our web site and enjoy any past episode at: HISPros.com