We do! They say a change is a good as a rest and never more so, than when I visited the Care Show at the NEC in Birmingham on Wednesday 17th October 2018, with Dave Belcher, Convert’s Development Director.
As part of the diversification and expansion of Convert’s IP Portfolio, we have been working on our real-time Tracking Technology Solution for the Care Homes marketplace for the last 12 months, and we were at a suitable stage to talk about this proposition with the market, and to engage with potential partners. Hence our attendance at the show.
Overall, the show was well put together and we found the people on the stands to be very welcoming and friendly. More importantly, with our own parochial interest in mind, we received the following feedback:
Our patient tracking solution, as we described it (and possibly in time, broadening out to monitor carers and key equipment), is not currently available on the market, but highly sought after. Organisations had ‘some’ aspects of it, but certainly not a full solution.
The 2-way communication channel internally of a care home, as well as being able to contact loved ones, was seen as a key feature and one we are planning for Phase 2
Overall, we enjoyed genuine interest from companies who wanted to engage in further discussion about the opportunities for partnering – in particular, enthusiasm was heightened by our need for partners and our position as the technology partner, which is non-competitive, and therefore seen as a good fit.
From visiting the show, we have picked up a solid lead for a potential real-time tracking solution for a hospital A&E Department, and will follow that up early in November.
Interestingly, the health & social care market sees our IOT platform, originally built for the HiFi and home entertainment sector, as “similar” sort of technology, which it is, and gives us great experience and track record in designing and building solutions of this type.
I was struck by the myriad of different care systems and devices that are on the market – these will need to evolve in the future, as there is certainly a need to maintain ‘open standards, secure identity and interoperability’, which are then ‘crucial to the success of technology use in health and social care’, as described by the Health and Social Care Secretary, Matt Hancock – for full article please see https://www.digitalhealth.net/2018/10/hancock-tech-revolution-mandatory-open-standards/
This is very much music to our ears, as our proposed solutions with patient tracking have these principles very much at the core of how we would implement them, working with our partners. We now intend to follow up the 10 or so leads we have for potential partnering on patient/resident tracking, and engage with these companies as our solutions develop further.
So, overall we are excited and encouraged that the initiative with patient tracking fits right into the sweet spot of our vision……..’to improve upon current technologies and invent new ways of doing things that help and improve the lives of others.’
Here at Convert, we have aspects of our technological approach that are truly disruptive, but we are also able to take a step back to see how other organisations are finding solutions to problems in other sectors. If we see something that is working well but could be improved in some way, or implemented from a different perspective, we’ll take it on. That then also puts us into the ‘sustaining technology’ camp, and that feels to us like a sensible, and balanced business model. More on this subject will feature on our website very soon!
Overall, the show was well put together and we found the people on the stands to be very welcoming and friendly. More importantly, with our own parochial interest in mind, we received the following feedback:
From visiting the show, we have picked up a solid lead for a potential real-time tracking solution for a hospital A&E Department, and will follow that up early in November.I was struck by the myriad of different care systems and devices that are on the market – these will need to evolve in the future, as there is certainly a need to maintain ‘open standards, secure identity and interoperability’, which are then ‘crucial to the success of technology use in health and social care’, as described by the Health and Social Care Secretary, Matt Hancock – for full article please see https://www.digitalhealth.net/2018/10/hancock-tech-revolution-mandatory-open-standards/