Cloud Providers Tapping Into Vertical Markets
For cloud services providers, there's a horizontal approach to service development that most providers take, but there's also a strong business case to be made for vertical services. Vertical markets present a strong growth opportunity for cloud providers, and one of those verticals that has been growing quickly is health care.
For cloud services providers, there’s a horizontal approach to service development that most providers take, but there’s also a strong business case to be made for vertical services. Vertical markets present a strong growth opportunity for cloud providers, and one of those verticals that has been growing quickly is health care.
We’ve covered the healthcare vertical frequently and recently, and cloud services providers are clearly finding success in building and targeting apps at a variety of healthcare organizations and businesses. Take Peak 10 as the latest example of a cloud provider who has had success in the healthcare vertical.
Peak 10 recently announced it had scored a new multiyear cloud services contract with Premier, a healthcare alliance consisting of about 2,800 community hospitals and 95,000 alternate sites. That’s a big win for the cloud services provider.
Under the terms of the contract, Peak 10 will provide Premier and its members with pre-negotiated rates related to its Recovery Cloud offering. Peak 10’s Recovery Cloud provides customers with cloud-based disaster recovery—a business and IT issue affecting everyone, of course. But when it comes to health care, loss of data and downtime can result in lost lives.
“Downtime and lost data can be caused by the simplest, smallest error. Due to the private data and mission-critical IT infrastructure that healthcare companies must securely maintain — and the steep federal fines imposed if they are not — subpar disaster recovery solutions are not an option,” said Pat O’Brien, Peak 10 vice president and general manager responsible for its Charlotte-based operations, in a prepared statement. “With Peak 10’s Recovery Cloud, which is built on our HIPAA-compliant cloud platform, Premier members can enjoy the security, redundancy and efficiencies that our solution delivers.”
Peak 10 isn’t strictly focused on health care, but the company has focused some of its R&D and marketing efforts to serving the growing healthcare cloud services market. It’s not alone. In the spring, Box released new partner apps designed to fill the cloud needs of healthcare firms, and 8×8 launched a cloud VoIP offering meant to address HIPAA and HITECH compliance regulations.
There has been a stronger push to get healthcare companies to adopt cloud computing, and industry analysts expect the healthcare cloud market to be valued at up to $11 billion over the next three years.
Sounds like a great—and growing—opportunity for cloud services providers.
