Cost reduction and added value through innovation applies to all industries

The health sector is an area which is continuously confronted with the subjects cost pressure and improvement potentials for patients and personnel. Experts see, in addition to management, in particular with operators such as hospitals, high demand to optimise the entire medical performance chain.

In order to streamline the process and to increase the quality of treatment, modern IKT solutions exist increasingly and the industry can thereby fall back on integrally developed holistic hospital information systems (HIS) in the meantime. More and more, the increasing use of mobile tools of doctors and employees must also be integrated and thereby also a secure data management which is available at any time.

Support for employees and customers
The Steiermärkische Hospital Association (KAGes), with 23 hospitals and care centres as well as over 17,000 employees, is one of the largest hospital companies in Europe, the largest Styrian employer, and, in parallel, also a corresponding stimulus for the domestic economy. Together with T-Systems, the hospital information system IS-H based on SAP and i.s.h.med was introduced, and in addition, the operation of the IT hardware to T-Systems was also taken charge of. "The plurality of functions supports employees in their individual work processes and we additionally achieve a contemporary medical and caring support of patients," says Karl Kocever, Director IKT operation in the KAGes.

The decisive role of payment services
Trade is confronted with similar high challenges as the health sector. The competition with new online shops from the internet is becoming increasingly intense and the payment services play a decisive role thereby in addition to the processing of goods and logistics. Even though online trade is generally also booming in Austria, the turnover potential is often recumbent. This is made clear by a view at the so-called conversion rate. This number specifies how many buyers actually conclude the visit to an online shop with a purchase. In reality, only 33 persons of 100 go to the virtual checkout and make the purchase. Surveys show that a confusing and elaborate payment process or the absence of the preferred type of payment are mentioned as the main reasons for cancellation.

Increase the purchase conclusions
Payment service providers such as Klarna now offer online traders checkout solutions that can be integrated easily, where the most popular types of payment are bundled in a single complete solution. “Customers want to have a simple and intuitive checkout, attach importance to security and a broad selection of payment types. With Klarna checkout, we could increase the purchase conclusions on desktops to 32 and on mobile devices to 42 %”, says Christian Richter from Apotheke.at.