Navigating Supply Chain: The Purpose Driven Deal

The current health care industry is a breeding ground of new opportunities for collaboration. Prompted in part by health care reform and new federal regulations, the environment has encouraged providers to look for new ways of structuring transactions and procurement decisions in an effort to create efficiencies and improve patient care. These new strategies often focus on collaboration and partnership, rather than the traditional method of entering into adversarial negotiations. These strategies are intended to minimize risk exposure and maximize revenue, which often occurs at the direct expense of the opposing party. Health care entities that are seeking to form new partnerships must have a general understanding of the health care environment, including the major legal developments that have driven changes in the industry. A successful partnership also requires an understanding of the specific concerns and pressures that apply to the other parties involved in the arrangement. Thus, the degree to which the health care entity is successful in forming a partnership will depend on the extent to which the entity understands both the external factors (health care environment) and internal factors (the opposing entity’s own pressures and challenges) that bear on the partnership arrangement.