36. Health Metrics

Revenue: $4.3 million
Growth: 138%
Founders: Steven Strange
Head office: Victoria
Year founded: 2008
Employees: 30
Industry: Health care
Website: www.healthmetrics.com.au

This is the first time Health Metrics has made it on to the Smart50.

Founded in 2008 by Steven Strange, who has a background in IT management, the technology company took two years to hit the $1 million revenue mark and the last financial year turned over more than $4.3 million.

The business has increased its workforce by 10 in the past year and now employs a staff of 30.

Health Metrics was created with the aim of supplying a complete clinical and administrative software system to support different types of aged care providers, with the hope that such data can help prevent elderly falls.

Its eCase clinical care software, which allows care staff and executives to better manage accountability and workload based on the provider’s care policies, is now considered one of the best on the market.

It has now been picked up by major aged care providers in New Zealand and there is a full Mandarin version of the software for the Chinese market.

Strange told SmartCompany the technology behind Health Metrics allows care staff to see in real-time the policy impact of a resident who, for example, has had more than a certain number of falls within a given period of time.

“Incidents such as falls and other episodes of behaviour are big issues for residential aged care providers,” he says.

“Conventional wisdom sees most providers tallying and analysing such events at the end of the month. As such, a considerable period of time has passed before any intervention measures are made.”

Strange says keeping track of these events in real-time is a “ground-breaking paradigm shift”.

He says a big challenge early on was to understand some of the aged care industry’s complexities – including wading through government legislation and compliance requirements – while another was getting the technology under the noses of key decision makers.

“Taking booths at key industry conferences, the software was demonstrated to anyone whose attention was available,” he says.

“Once they saw the offer, Health Metrics started to grow, simply by word of mouth.”

For Strange, Health Metrics growth strategy is tied up in building the brand in the Asia Pacific region, with specific goals in the next 12 months to expand in New Zealand, China and beyond.

“Our goals are to provide versions of eCase to markets such as the NZ, US, UK and to expand our operations in China, to support the demand for efficiencies for providers,” he says.