Orion Health signs five-year, $9.3M deal in Dorset

Tuesday 18 April 2017 09:11 AM

Orion Health signs five-year, $9.3M deal in Dorset

By Paul McBeth

April 18 (BusinessDesk) - Orion Health signed a $9.3 million five-year contract to license its Amadeus precision medicine platform to Dorset County Council in England as the software developer fends off suggestions its chief executive should step aside over delays in its sales pipeline.

A portion of the 5.2 million British pound deal will be recognised in the 12 months ended March 31, with the bulk in following years, and will cover the region's 765,000 people, Auckland-based Orion said in a statement. The service will pool patient information from hospitals, GPs, community teams and local councils, creating a single source to access a patient's medical history which is seen as enabling more coordinated care with better treatments and shorter delays.

The deal comes almost a fortnight after the software developer downgraded guidance for the 2017 financial year due to a series of contracts taking longer to close than anticipated, projecting operating revenue of between $194 million and $200 million, and saying Orion was in talks to attract new funding.

That's prompted speculation chief executive and founder Ian McCrae may have to relinquish the top job as the company's shares sank to $1.34, less than a quarter of their initial public offering price of $5.70 in November 2014, something the company's head brushed aside in an interview with Fairfax Media.

Investors have become cautious about software companies since the collapse of intelligence analytics firm Wynyard Group last year, which failed to close contracts fast enough to keep pace with its rapid global expansion.

Orion went public almost two-and-a-half years ago, raising $120 million to scale up the business in a bid to grab a global market share and forgoing short-term earnings. The company still expects to return to profit in the 2018 financial year.

(BusinessDesk)

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