The partnership “will focus on cross-promoting respective market intelligence services in the firms' respective home markets,” a KLAS statement said. “EHI will cross-market KLAS reports in the UK, while KLAS will cross-market EHI research products and events to U.S.-based suppliers working in the U.K. market.”
Early last year, Jared Peterson, executive vice president of research operations at KLAS, said the Orem, Utah-based company had an interest in a measured expansion of its operations outside the U.S., buoyed in part by what he described as the “energy” he experienced at a U.K. trade show.
In the KLAS statement, Jon Hoeksma, co-founder of EHealth Media, said, "The U.K. health IT market is undergoing huge change, but it lacks good, reliable performance measures, both on supplier performance and on how healthcare providers benefit from technology investments. The new partnership between EHI and KLAS will help advance the visibility of both and help NHS (National Health Service) trusts make the most of their technology investments.”
It is not the first HIMSS conference outside the U.S., but the first targeting both Australia and New Zealand. HIMSS held its first conference abroad, the World of Health IT Conference and Exhibition, in Geneva, Switzerland in 2006. The following year it hosted its first Asia/Pacific conference in Singapore. Last year, HIMSS hosted meetings or shows Abu Dhabi, Copenhagen, Kuala Lumpur, Sydney and two in Singapore.
Although Global health IT market watcher IDC Health Insights forecasted health IT spending in the U.K. will remain “sluggish” until 2014, annual spending in the health IT sector throughout Western Europe will grow from $13.3 billion in 2011 to $14.9 billion in 2016, a 12% increase.
