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March 2008 • Volume 13 Number 3
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Member Profile: SIEMENS
Aaron is often called upon for media and industry analyst interviews and is a frequent presenter. In addition to his experience with smart card solutions, he has also held senior marketing positions with Tivo, LinkedIn and others. Aaron is currently the Vice Chair of the Smart Card Alliance Healthcare Council. 1. What are Siemens Medical Solutions' main business profile and offerings? Siemens Medical Solutions of Siemens AG (NYSE: SI) is one of the world’s largest suppliers to the healthcare industry. The company is known for bringing together innovative medical technologies, healthcare information systems, management consulting, and support services, to help customers achieve tangible, sustainable, clinical and financial outcomes. Recent acquisitions in the area of in-vitro diagnostics – such as Diagnostic Products Corporation and Bayer Diagnostics – mark a significant milestone for Siemens as it becomes the first full service diagnostics company. Employing more than 41,000 people worldwide and operating in over 130 countries, Siemens Medical Solutions reported sales of 8.23 billion EUR, orders of 9.33 billion EUR and group profit of 1.06 billion EUR for fiscal 2006 (Sept. 30). Further information can be found by visiting www.siemens.com/medical. 2. What role does smart card technology play in supporting Siemens business? Incomplete medical information is a leading cause of the nearly 100,000 deaths that occur each year due to medical errors in the U.S., and it’s estimated that tens of billions of dollars are lost to fraud. Siemens’ smart card-based Patient Health Card solution can help address these issues by providing positive patient identification as well as a convenient, secure means to access critical patient data. In addition, Patient Health Cards are being used to streamline patient registration processes, to help prevent duplicate medical records and to improve medical claims processing. 3. What trends do you see developing in the market that Siemens hopes to capitalize on? Current business issues with hospitals such as the needs to reduce costs, prevent duplicate medical records and streamline registration processing are driving demand for the Patient Health Card solution today. Several trends in healthcare may benefit from smart card technology in the future. These include the ability to exchange key medical information between hospitals and other healthcare providers, the need to address the issue and cost of healthcare identity fraud, and the desire of patients to have better control of their medical information. 4. What obstacles to growth do you see that must be overcome to capitalize on these opportunities? The biggest obstacle to the growth of smart cards in healthcare is arguably awareness. Healthcare IT leaders are well aware of the issues related to patient identification and the need to exchange medical information; however, smart card technology is generally not considered as a way to address these problems. For example, regarding the exchange of medical data, online offerings are typically the first to come to mind. Smart cards can clearly complement such offerings and should not be considered competitive. This is where market education is needed. Several hospitals are taking the lead and are helping to improve the visibility of smart cards in healthcare. Additional awareness and education about the technology, benefits and applications of smart cards in healthcare will help to overcome this obstacle. 5. How do you see your involvement in the Alliance and the Healthcare Council helping Siemens? The Smart Card Alliance Healthcare Council provides an ideal resource to address the primary obstacle mentioned earlier – awareness. IT leaders are much more open to information received from an industry association than a technology provider, especially when it comes to learning about the technology, its benefits and applications. Working with the Healthcare Council also allows Siemens to expand its relationships with other technology providers and to gather additional market requirements and trend information to support future solution development. 6. As vice chair of the Alliance Healthcare Council, what do you see are the key goals for the Council in the coming year? I would like to work with the rest of the Healthcare Council to step up the awareness and education regarding the use of smart cards in the healthcare market over the next year. This will likely be achieved through a combination of deliverables and activities including white papers, webinars, speaking opportunities, web site content and other promotion activities. Another strategy of the Healthcare Council is to engage other potential stakeholders, such as insurance companies, both to improve the awareness and to help extend the value proposition and business case for smart cards in the healthcare market by identifying new use cases and benefits.
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This month, Smart Card Talk spoke Aaron Zitzer, Senior Product Marketing Manager for Identity Solutions at Siemens. In this role within Siemens Medical Solutions, Aaron oversees the Siemens Patient Health Card and Clinic Card solutions as well as other identity and access management products used within healthcare and other markets. 
