ACS predicts strong growth for mobile

Advanced Computer Systems has announced a healthy set of half-year figures, predicting that the public sector will continue to spend on IT - and mobile services in particular – as it looks to save money.

ACS Group revenue for the first half was £47.3m, while adjusted pre-tax profit came in at £10.4m. The group’s Health and Care division grew by 5%, while the Business Solutions and Managed Services divisions saw growth of 4% and 9% respectively.

The company, which earlier in the year signed a partnership with Vodafone Group to sell its iNurse mobile phone application for nurses, said it was in advanced discussions with other mobile operators.

Vin Murria, ACS chief executive, told eHealth Insider it had signed a deal with primary care supplier EMIS to enable interoperability between iNurse and EMIS Web.

Murria said that the iNurse staff rostering and activity scheduling tools offered significant productivity benefits to nurses and carers in the community. “It can give a 20-40% improvement in productivity; or up to two extra visits a day by a carer.”

She told EHI that ACS was expecting to have 11,000-13,000 mobile users by the end of the year, but believed the total market in health in social care was up to 500,000 users. “Our global target is to have 20% of that 500,000 number within four years.”

Sales during the first half continued to climb as public and private sector organisations invested in software to cut costs by boosting efficiency, ACS said. The company's forward order book now stands at £100m.

In addition to mobile solutions, the ACS chief executive said some of the biggest opportunities for ACS existed with new NHS 111 services.

“We’ve implemented the first three sites already and think that the opportunity is four times the size of the out-of-hours market.”