For the average organization, maintaining its own data storage servers and networking hardware on-site is costly and time-intensive. The healthcare sector is no exception, with hospitals and pharmaceutical companies often struggling to optimize operations and balance limited resources.
As a result, increasing numbers of users are turning to cloud computing providers, which provide IT infrastructure, virtual machines, servers, and operating systems in exchange for a regular subscription fee instead of setting up their own systems.
There are other reasons why a healthcare or pharma player might consider using cloud computing providers. For example, healthcare and patient data that is crucial for implementing precision medicine is traditionally stored in fragmented “silos” that are difficult to harness. Setting up a cloud-based platform lets users process their data more efficiently and even use it to generate AI-based models to automate analyses and develop precision treatments more quickly than before. The services are also easily scalable, making it easier and cheaper to launch acquisition deals by speeding up integration.
The potential of cloud computing in the life sciences space is leading to a compound annual growth rate of 32.7% globally. The market size is expected to skyrocket from around $8 billion in 2024 to nearly $77 billion in 2031. The market growth is also driven by the rising prevalence of chronic diseases in the population and research into advanced treatments such as gene therapies.
Based on market reports, we have outlined five of the key players in specialized cloud computing services for healthcare and pharmaceutical users.
1. Cisco Systems
Founded: 1984
Headquarters: San Jose, California
Market cap: $184.5 billion
Cisco was founded by a group of computer scientists and went public in 1990. The company has a fleet of software solutions that provide IT services across many industries, focusing on networking, security, collaboration, data centers, and the internet of things.
In terms of the healthcare space, Cisco helps healthcare providers manage their workflows and keep data secure within networks of workspaces, hospitals, and clinics.
In one use case, its infrastructure and web services help clinical care providers run critical research and management tasks virtually and support AI and machine learning-based tools for data analytics. This helps clients access patient data securely and more quickly than traditional methods, and reduces the cost of running a data center.
Cisco also offers ways to carry out patient care in a remote setting by connecting healthcare companies with monitoring and telehealth technology as well as mobile devices.
To boost its offerings, Cisco runs partnerships with a wide range of companies like Rockwell Automation to modernize their digital infrastructure, and Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google to expand its cloud services.
2. Dell Technologies
Founded: 2016
Headquarters: Round Rock, Texas
Market cap: $103.4 billion
In 2015, a $67 billion merger of the U.S. computer vendor Dell Inc. and EMC—an enterprise software and storage company—led to the creation of Dell Technologies, which went public in 2018.
According to its website, Dell EMC is used by 6,000 hospitals worldwide and by 7 out of 10 pharmaceutical companies. The company is geared to help customers simplify their administration, coordinate and personalize patient care, and improve patient outcomes.
To usher in more tailored approaches to patient care, the company focuses on helping users optimize patient data collection and generate helpful insights. Users can then use AI to speed up digital pathology and precision diagnostics—techniques that help healthcare professionals tailor their approach to a patient.
Other services offered by Dell include supporting mobile internet-connected devices, which allows employees work from where patients are, and virtual reality devices, which are augmented reality-based tools used by professional to enhance remote imaging and diagnosis.
3. IBM Corporation
Founded: 1911
Headquarters: Armonk, New York
Market cap: $162.12 billion
In the early days, IBM Corporation sold data-processing “tabulating machines” that allowed governments and businesses automate data collection with the help of punched cards. The company continues to play a major role in the development of data processing equipment and has been public since 1962.
Nowadays, IBM offers a cloud service for clients in healthcare and other industries to help companies manage their workload while speeding up research and meeting security and compliance requirements.
One of IBM’s offerings lets users manage their network, storage, and security on demand, both with the infrastructure on their own premises and on the cloud. When handling sensitive patient data, IBM helps users follow industry compliance standards by using the highest-level encryption certification among cloud providers. The company states that this feature lets users keep their data secure.
As IBM is a long-time developer of AI-based tools, it also provides an AI-powered tool called Watson Assistant that uses natural language processing to help the user gain more insights from their data and boost productivity.
IBM sold assets from its Watson Health business in 2022, carving out the U.S. company Merative. However, IBM continues to focus on its cloud computing services and making them available to healthcare providers.
4. Microsoft Corporation
Founded: 1975
Headquarters: Redmond, Washington
Market cap: $3.4 trillion
One of the most famous tech companies in the world, Microsoft was founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen to develop software for early computers. The company developed Windows in 1985, went public in 1986, and had become a key player in the personal computer software space by the end of the decade.
The company has a range of offerings for healthcare players. One is AI-based tools that can pore over lab data and design molecules to reduce the time and costs of drug discovery. Another is Azure, which can be used to transform a siloed data environment into an analytics platform to improve factory operations.
Other functions that Microsoft promises for life sciences include visibility of risks in the supply chain, where a dysfunctional system can have ripple effects on finances, and assistance with patient data collection, which can help providers tailor their approaches.
As part of its thrust into the healthcare space, Microsoft bought compatriot company Nuance Communications for $19.7 billion in 2021. The key acquisition was Nuance’s clinical speech recognition technology, which helps clinical professionals cut paperwork and improve patient experiences. The tech giant also recently teamed up with NVIDIA to pool their computing power in a bid to make it easier for users to set up AI models that speed up drug discovery.
5. Oracle Corporation
Founded: 1977
Headquarters: Austin, Texas
Market cap: $387.7 billion
Oracle was set up by computer programmers and went public in 1986. The company was registered in Silicon Valley for decades but migrated to Austin, Texas, in 2020. Earlier this year, Oracle decided to relocate again to Nashville, Tennessee, as part of a push into the healthcare space.
Oracle helps customers store their clinical development lifecycles securely on its cloud platform and carry out research and development. For instance, users can collect and store metadata from all over the organization in a convenient location to improve data governance. It also helps investigators carry out data analytics from combined data sources and generate simulations with high-powered computers.
In a further effort to stake territory in healthcare, Oracle acquired compatriot firm Cerner in 2021. Cerner specializes in selling digital information systems to hospitals to improve their patient service. Together the companies would have the “capacity to transform healthcare delivery by providing medical professionals with better information,” said Oracle chief technology officer Larry Ellison in a public release.
Earlier this year, Oracle unveiled a partnership with Google Cloud to help users easily migrate and modernize their applications with multiple cloud systems. The move is designed to benefit companies from different industries like healthcare, manufacturing, and financial services.
Jonathan Smith is a freelance science journalist based in the U.K. and Spain. He previously worked in Berlin as reporter and news editor at Labiotech, a website covering the biotech industry. Prior to this, he completed a PhD in behavioral neurobiology at the University of Leicester and freelanced for the U.K. organizations Research Media and Society of Experimental Biology. He has also written for medwireNews, Biopharma Reporter, and Outsourcing Pharma.
