Sequoia-backed Health Catalyst swaps stake for hospital’s data

(Bloomberg) — A startup backed by Sequoia Capital is giving up a stake in the company in exchange for a mountain of hospital data that will help predict which patients are bound to come back to the ER.

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Health Catalyst Inc. will license Allina Health System’s data and predictive models for an undisclosed stake, the companies said today. In the 10-year deal, Allina — a nonprofit hospital system in Minnesota and Wisconsin — will also pay as much as $108 million for Health Catalyst to run its analytics to slash costs and improve patient health.

The pact comes as health care is increasingly turning more to Big Data to steer patient care, with health analytics set to grow at 8 percent a year through 2018, according to IDC Health Insights. Revenue at Health Catalyst surged more than fourfold last year as it doubled the number of clients.

About 20 percent of the $108 million Allina will pay Salt Lake City-based Health Catalyst for running its analytics is dependent on hitting cost and health goals.

“The way that it was set up is quite novel,” Judy Hanover, an analyst at IDC who was briefed on the deal, said in a phone interview. “A risk-based relationship that’s actually based on the performance, the operational performance of the health system, is novel. That was new to me.”