Gartner recently conducted a study of global, enterprise EHR system leaders, and came up with a conceptual map, displaying the leaders, visionaries, and niche players. Not surprisingly, Epic and Cerner are the favorites, occupying the “Leaders” quadrant, so named for its ability to execute and completeness of vision, while slightly smaller companies like Siemens, Meditech and Intersystems win the title of “Visionaries”. Conspicuously absent from the list are other big players in the EHR space, such as G.E. Centricity and athenahealth. The omissions are based on international reach: only systems that are marketed and sold in more than one continent were considered.

In terms of strategy going forward, ability to execute and completeness of vision are both very important aspects of EHR system leaders, but which will be required to stay on top? My guess is that completeness of vision will matter most in the coming years. When we’re talking about the most successful companies, variances in ability to execute will be small. All top companies must be near excellence in their ability to deploy, maintain, and upgrade their systems.

The real difference enters into a company’s ability not only to, as Gartner describes, understand buyer needs and translate those needs into products and services. These companies must also create products and services that actually deliver what the market demands. Population health management and other analytics services may claim to identify risk pools, but to deliver requires accuracy of vision, not just adding another catch-phrase to a system’s list of services.