Cerner Acquires Bridge Medical
Cerner gets a steal with the acquisition of Bridge Medical for $11 million, just 2 1/2 years after AmerisourceBergen acquired Bridge for $27 million.. In a face saving gesture, AmerisourceBergen notes that the acquisition agreement provides for future performance-based payments through Jan.
1, 2006, and allows it to continue marketing Bridge's software as part
of its patient-safety products.
Bridge Medical always had a valuable but narrow value proposition, and
acquisition was probably their principle exit strategy. Bridge should
be a much better fit with Cerner who has an existing product line that
can more directly leverage the feature set provided by Bridge. Of
the traditional phama distributors, Cardinal Health has by far done the best with their Clinical Technologies and Services group, run by Dave Schlotterbeck.
