Epic Systems Corp. is using April Fools' Day to poke fun at Jim Cramer, the TV personality who encouraged Apple to buy the EHR giant earlier this year.
Epic restructured its home page April 1 with an announcement it had hired the CNBC "Mad Money" host and former hedge fund manager as its new financial adviser. In January, Cramer had suggested Apple purchase Epic to scale the iPhone's health records service and prove that the company is serious about the healthcare market.
"It's time for (Apple) to make a big, splashy acquisition ... in the software space," he said on "Mad Money." "It would force investors and analysts to re-evaluate Apple as more than just a hardware company."
Epic, for its part, has categorically rejected the suggestion.
Enter April Fools' Day.
"Epic announced it added an unorthodox hire: CNBC 'Mad Money' host Jim Cramer is now the company's financial advisor," Epic's home page read.
"The fiery TV personality stirred up the health IT world earlier this year when he urged Apple to acquire Epic to make inroads into the healthcare software market. Epic, a privately held corporation sitting atop foundational commandments like 'do not go public' and 'do not be acquired' had little to say at the time, except for CEO Judy Faulkner, who remarked 'Who's Jim Cramer?' " it continued.
Cramer retweeted the mock announcement Monday morning with a note: "Untrue—they will never sell or come public ... They are unto themselves..." CNBC did not immediately respond to Modern Healthcare's request for comment.
Other updates to Epic's home page Monday included a patient module dubbed "MyMom," which pushes healthy habits such as "remember your sunscreen" and "bundle up," and job posts for staff to answer phone calls meant for Epic Games—the developer of the popular video game Fortnite.
Epic has a history of topical April Fools' Day pranks.
For last year's April Fools' Day, Epic promoted a new program that provides service dogs for emotional support during software go-lives. The year prior, the company unveiled "Epic TinDr," an app that said it would allow patients and physicians to select one another with Tinder-style swiping.
