Month: May 2012

Recon takes an analytical look behind select developments in healthcare

Heartland Health: Marching towards Kansas City with Mayo on its shoulder

Tory Wolff May 31, 2012

Earlier this month, Heartland Health signed a deal with the Mayo Clinic for its doctors to virtually consult cases with Mayo physicians in return for an undisclosed fee. Heartland Health is a regional medical system in northwest Missouri and includes a ~350 bed acute care hospital (Heartland Regional Medical Center) with 200+ medical staff physicians, and the Heartland Clinic with 100 providers in 23 locations. Heartland is now the fifth hospital system to join the Mayo Clinic Care Network (MCCN), a structure launched by Mayo in September 2011. The deal substantially

The Blues system and PHIXs: not standardizing on a single utility

Tory Wolff May 29, 2012

BCBSMN has licensed the platform for its private health insurance exchange (PHIX) and defined contribution product from eHealth (original announcement April 30). For eHealth, which has seen its government systems revenue fall off by $2M year-over-year in the most recent quarter (per Q1 2012 analyst call), the deal will be a welcome addition to its non-commission revenue stream. It also represents a significant in-road into the Blues system (the previous deal with Blues I could uncover was in mid-2010 for licensing the technology behind Premera’s online Medsupp sales). It appears

Towers Watson’s bold move in private insurance exchanges: leapfrog Aon and leave Mercer’s alliance compromised

Tory Wolff May 23, 2012

With its acquisition of Extend Health, Towers Watson has ensured that (1) PHIXs will be a key competitive arena among the major benefits consultants and (2) that it has taken the lead. Extend Health serves 170K members and has annual revenues of ~$50M+, EBITDA margins of ~30% and a growth rate in the most recent reported quarter of 40% vs. a year ago (all taken from the S-1 filing and acquisition press release). Two leading competitors have been publicly discussing their capability building: Aon Hewitt began their exchange in April

CIGNA fills in its Medicare portfolio with Great American acquisition

Tory Wolff May 15, 2012

Last week, CIGNA acquired the Great American Supplemental Benefits from American Financial Group (AFG) for $295M in cash. Per press releases, the key financials for the acquired business are: A few observations on the acquired business: ~90% of the acquired revenue is driven by MedSupp. Public reports suggest 100K-125K MedSupp lives (250K lives total for the acquired business). Historically, AG’s MedSupp lives have been well distributed in the US with the exception of a sizeable position in Texas (the acquired business is Austin-based). The other 10% includes a variety of

Month: May 2012

Recon takes an analytical look behind select developments in healthcare

Heartland Health: Marching towards Kansas City with Mayo on its shoulder

The Blues system and PHIXs: not standardizing on a single utility

Towers Watson’s bold move in private insurance exchanges: leapfrog Aon and leave Mercer’s alliance compromised

CIGNA fills in its Medicare portfolio with Great American acquisition

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