You are welcome. The list was the result of a very quick online search, and it was really intended to start a discussion about your questions and mine, if anyone was interested. Something interesting has already come out of it: you are in the healthcare field. To me, that says you would be a good sounding board for this discussion.

As I understand it, Crossflo's services primarily address the secure exchange of data between disparate databases, such as in local entities (law enforcement, for example) that have spent years building their databases in relative isolation and are now requiring to connect them in a national way. Crossflo's solution provides the "translation," if you will, so that queries and exchanges of data are performed using a single field identifier ("LAST_NAME" for example) that will return the "last name" related results no matter what the field is called (e.g., L_NAME, NAME_LAST, NAME_L). This is a very simple example, and the CDX product is far more complex. I understand some of it, and I am attempting to learn about more of it.

I took a quick look at Epic and Cerner. Both appears to offer software and services that do not necessarily address what I see as the potential for combining the need to interconnect healthcare systems with disparate databases that are not part of a hosted service such as what Cerner seems to be centering on, nor the localized (meaning just within a small organization) solution that they both seem to offer. Put another way, how do two hospitals, one in Maine and one in California, for example, that are not part of the Cerner solution, share records data in a seamless way when they have each invested in their own proprietary-like technologies, which are likely incompatible? This, to me, is the strength of what Crossflo's partnership with HP addresses, and when Iameter is included, the quality of services tracking element is integrated into the whole solution.

I could be more concise if I had more time, but I think you can see where I am going on this. There are many holes, I admit, but it is my hope that in this discussion we can fill-in some of them and derive a better picture of the future possibilities of Patriot's secure data exchange venture. I would be interested in your view from the healthcare perspective. Would you, for example, see the HP/Crossflo/Iameter eventually becoming a big EMR solution and a player in the hospital arena? Perhaps we don't have enough information at this time.

Thanks

DG