As hospitals and health systems adopt more and more tech to keep up with the times, they’ve found themselves knee-deep in applications and information systems, that only seem to make things messier. It’s like they took 12 jigsaw puzzles, dumped all the pieces into one box, and are now trying to make a butterfly when most of the pieces fit a different puzzle. Today, there’s an application rationalization movement as CIOs work with their executive teams to pursue strategies that minimize risks and manage technology better and with tighter resources.
Our mission is to bring order to the chaos. And trust me, it’s not just about making IT leaders’ lives easier (though that’s a nice bonus) but, more importantly, about helping caregivers focus on what matters most: patient care.
Too many systems, not enough time
Healthcare organizations are operating with thousands of point-product applications. I’m talking 2,000 to 3,000 in some cases. That’s an unmanageable tangle with big consequences. Financially, it means you have zero leverage since you’re dealing with so many vendors. Security-wise? It’s a nightmare trying to keep track of that many endpoints and ensure compliance. And from a human perspective, just imagine the sheer amount of time and effort spent managing systems that don’t speak the same language. It’s a head-scratching, wallet-draining, time-sucking mess.
And no one feels that pain more than nurse leaders who have to log into 12 or 15 different systems just to run a single shift. That’s two-plus hours of administrative work—not to mention frustration—that pulls them away from patient care. With a 30% nursing shortage across the country, this is a problem we can’t afford to ignore.
At symplr, we believe there’s a better way to drive a lot of waste and inefficiencies out of the system and make healthcare future ready. By consolidating systems onto fewer, smarter platforms that solve multiple problems, digital health leaders can cut costs, simplify operations, tighten security, and, most importantly, give time back to caregivers to do what they’re meant to do. No nurse entered the profession dreaming of a future spent staring at screens and playing data-entry detective. They want to provide care, and our job is to help make that possible.
Healthcare operations: ripe for improvement
Over the past few years, we saw a massive opportunity and deliberately started putting together powerful tools and insights to create a new category called healthcare operations. Why focus here? Because as much as you’d rather not think about it, there’s an enormous burden of administrative tasks that have to happen to run any healthcare system. Credentialing, scheduling, compliance, supply chain management, quality tracking… you name it. Clinicians might describe this stuff as “the chores no one wants to do, but they’ve got to get done.” We knew we could either tackle these pain points one by one, or we could zoom out, see the bigger picture, and address the entire category.
We doubled down on the latter, acquiring leading technologies in critical areas of non-clinical healthcare operations. Provider data management, nurse and physician scheduling, spend management, vendor access compliance, and more—we brought the best together under one roof. But acquisitions were only Step 1. Step 2 in making the puzzle pieces fit. That’s where the magic (and the hard work) really happens.
This year marks a milestone for us with the rollout of the symplr Operations Platform. Built on the back of years of effort and countless hours of development, focusing on interoperability, shared workflows, and seamless integration, we’ve achieved the holy grail of consolidation. We’ve partnered with AWS for cloud infrastructure, built API gateways, created a common data lake, and worked tirelessly to connect our solutions in a way that truly multiplies value for our customers.
And we’re not stopping here. We’ve brought best practices from other horizontal industries plus our 30+ years of experience together for real impact. By leveraging the rich data we can now consolidate, we’ll continue driving productivity, efficiency, and cost savings for healthcare systems.
AI, but make it responsible
No conversation about innovation is complete without AI. It’s the buzzword of a generation, but at symplr, we see it as more than hype. Our approach to AI is based on working with it for almost 15 years. But the thing about AI in healthcare is if you don’t understand the data it uses, its inputs, its outputs, or the infrastructure it’s built on, you’re flirting with major risks.
We’ve taken a “go slow to go fast” approach with generative AI. Instead of jumping on the bandwagon and launching bots willy-nilly, we’ve partnered strategically with AWS to bake generative AI and large language models into core applications where they’ll have the most meaningful, low-risk impact. The result? Workflow enhancements that used to take hours now deliver insights in seconds or minutes. It’s about improving productivity without exposing healthcare systems to the vulnerabilities that come with undisciplined AI deployment.
At the end of the day, we’re tech optimists, but we’re also measured optimists. We believe technology should empower users, not overwhelm them. And if it can give people back precious time and energy, even better.
Bringing it all together
We’re focused on simplifying what’s become too complicated, unifying what’s been fragmented, and innovating responsibly in ways that create real value for healthcare systems.
We’re here to lighten the load, remove the dysfunction, connect the dots, and optimize healthcare operations so that caregivers can spend more time doing what they love. After all, no one gets into healthcare because they love spreadsheets or sitting in front of a screen all day.
Now, back to those 12 puzzles in one box. With the right tools and strategy, we’re proving it’s possible to not just find the butterfly but show you how to make it fly.
