Cerner scores $4.3 billion Department of Defense contract for agency's EHR

The U.S. Department of Defense on Wednesday awarded a $4.3 billion contract to a team lead by Cerner, Leidos and Accenture to manage the military's electronic health records systems, a deal that is expected to hit $9 billion once all costs are accounted for.

Intermountain Health Care, Utah's largest healthcare provider and a customer of Cerner's, will act as an advisor to the team.

[Also: How Intermountain Healthcare CFO Albert Zimmerli is rethinking the revenue cycle]

Cerner beat out Epic, another EHR giant with perhaps the biggest marketshare among healthcare providers. Ultimately, the DoD said it wanted to give the contract to what it saw as the best off-the-shelf EHR solution.

"Market share was not a consideration," DoD Under Secretary for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics Frank Kendall told Healthcare IT News. "We wanted minimum modifications."

While the winner was announced until 5 p.m. Wednesday, news of the contract winner leaked at 3:30 p.m. in a story on NextGov citing unnamed sources. At that time, Cerner's stock on the Nasdaq to jump almost 5 percent to close at $73.40 a share. However, Cerner stock was down in pre-market trading Thursday.

See more coverage of the contract at sister site Healthcare IT News.

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