RIP: Neal Patterson

Neal Patterson, the founder of Cerner (CERN), has died.

Neal Patterson, who helped build Cerner Corp. into a health care IT giant and wrote another chapter in Kansas City’s entrepreneurial lore, died Sunday of complications after a recurrence of cancer. Cerner co-founder and Vice Chairman Cliff Illig has been named chairman and interim CEO.

Patterson, Illig and Paul Gorup came up with the idea for Cerner around a picnic table at Loose Park. Their idea of incorporating technology to improve health care grew into a public company and industry giant whose imprint is seen throughout the metropolitan area skyline. Along the way, Patterson and Illig prodded Kansas City to boost entrepreneurship, with Patterson regularly hosting events at his home where promising entrepreneurs could talk to local masters, and turned Kansas City into the “Soccer Capital of America” after leading a group that purchased what is now Sporting Kansas City and built Children’s Mercy Park.

Patterson was diagnosed with a soft-tissue cancer in January 2016. He last spoke in a surprise appearance at the Cerner Health Conference in November, recounting his experience as a cancer patient and his aspirations for the company.

“We have incredible trust in our providers — we have to. But, ultimately, we are at their mercy,” Patterson said. “The EHR needs to make medicine faster and safer, and there needs to be more participation from the patient. The industry’s not there yet. It’s still lacking and I know I was put in this position to make it better.”

Several years of furious growth have made Cerner the area’s largest private-sector employer, with more than 11,800 local employees last July — a total that came before the opening of the first two buildings in what will be a massive new corporate campus early this year. Cerner’s Innovations Campus was to house roughly 3,000 employees in the first two buildings and eventually have 16,000 employees. The company also has sizable workforces at its North Kansas City headquarters, its Realizations Campus in South Kansas City and its Continuous Campus in Kansas City, Kan.

Posted by on July 9th, 2017 at 7:56 pm


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