GE Healthcare’s Digital Transformation and What it Means for B2B Businesses

Organizations in the healthcare industry aren’t typically early adopters of new technology and business models, so it’s taken them some time to figure out a way to leverage a subscription-based model for medical equipment. But GE Healthcare has recently developed healthcare subscription models that work well for providers as well as patients. In this podcast, Todd Donzelli, talks about the SaaS transformation he helped implement during his time with GE Healthcare and what it means for B2B businesses. Healthcare subscription models Like any industry that relies on manufactured goods, healthcare organizations have an incentive to extend the life of their medical equipment as long as possible. For equipment manufacturers, that’s meant fewer sales and having to discount to stay competitive. But a subscription model helps keep healthcare organizations in close touch with their equipment manufacturers, which is a benefit to healthcare organizations, manufacturers, as well as patients. “We're establishing a regular cadence on a quarterly and a monthly basis, where we're focusing on customer outcomes,” says Donzelli in his discussion of healthcare subscription models at 10:46. “So it's really changing the paradigm of how GE Healthcare engages with its customers.” B2B subscription business model Though their model was typically to react when a customer needed service, the service arm of GE Healthcare was looking for more proactive ways to engage with customers. Using a B2B subscription business model allowed the service department to do just that. “it wasn't about just waiting for the phone to ring so I can come out and repair a piece of equipment,” says Donzelli in his discussion of the B2B subscription business model at 16:53. “It is sitting down with the customers and trying to be more of a strategic partner, just like we were trying to do in sales.” Subscription-based model Healthcare manufacturers interested in adopting a subscription-based model would do well to look at low-hanging fruit first, which tend to be digital products. However, Donzelli believes that the subscription-based model could extend beyond software to models like paying per MRI or CT scan, rather than owning the machines themselves. “We’re in the very early stages. As I look across the industry, it’s still a new concept,” Donzelli says in his discussion of the subscription-based model at 23:54. “But people are starting to recognize that there’s tremendous potential, not just for the digital side of the business, but the actual physical side of the business as well.”