Today we’d like to introduce you to Timothy Kelley.
Timothy, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
Medicine, technology, and design have been passions and hobbies of mine since I was very young. After spending many years in healthcare as a sales rep in pharmaceuticals, pharmacy benefit management, and veterinary supply, I ended up managing the medical division of the electronic conglomerate TDK in 2000.
At TDK we were on a mission to replace film with CDs as the digital format of exchange in radiology – just hand a doctor a CD with digital images instead of a box of X-Ray film. Upon leaving TDK, I started my own business to have more control over the software and services we delivered to customers. Listening to customers needs and concerns helped me build something they wanted.
Nautilus Medical is now in thousands of sites throughout the US including 33 of the top 50 medical centers. Major institutions such as Cedars-Sinai, Cleveland Clinic, Northwestern, New York Presbyterian, Shriner’s, University Medical Centers of Pennsylvania (UPENN), Pittsburgh (UPMC), Columbia, Cornell, Harvard, Wisconsin, Indiana, Arizona, and many more.
Nautilus Medical recently signed a global distribution and marketing agreement with Samsung Medical. Samsung has become very aggressive in the medical imaging space with ultrasounds, digital x-ray, CT and soon adding MRI. Samsung chose Nautilus due to the reputation of ease of use, features and problem-solving. Combined with an existing relationship at Google, Nautilus is poised to become a leader in imaging management on a global scale. It is a very exciting time at Nautilus’s offices.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
We have had many struggles since our beginning and those challenges just made us more focused and better at handling adversity. In November of 2009, we promoted our first iteration of software at the largest radiology show called RSNA (Radiology Society of North America) at its annual meeting in Chicago. The financial crisis was at its peak, and after two years of cost and development, no one was buying our software! We had to change from a revenue-focused business to a strategy focused business to survive.
We focused on delivering solutions to marquee sites that would build a reputation for us that we could leverage later once the crisis was behind us. After acquiring many high profile sites, we began to grow at a steady pace. We still have to work with compliance, security, and regulatory issues. At this point, funding our growth with global partners such as Samsung and Google will be our biggest struggle going forward, which is a good problem to have.
Nautilus Medical – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
Nautilus Medical is a technology development and marketing company focused on packaging and redistribution of radiological images and patient information. Our software can scan in documents, film, slides, convert images, anonymize data, and collect patient images and EMR data from the healthcare network. We then make sure it is in a universal format for exchange to patients and physicians.
As we say in our office “Its one thing to move information from A to B, but if they can’t use it, you didn’t achieve anything”. We solve many problems that the big guys like GE, Siemens, McKesson, and Philips just don’t handle, which is good for us. Many times these big companies call on us to resolve their customer’s problems on the healthcare network.
Nautilus has become known for reliability, security, speed, service, ease of use and number of features. The combination of these makes for a great reputation that is building a large network of users. We are very proud of the fact that so many top medical centers chose our software as a solution over many bigger players in the space. We find that when a hospital does their homework we come out ahead.
Our approach to design sets us apart from the others by being very visually appealing. Typical software is menu driven gray, drab looking software that does not consider the time it takes to learn a complete interface. Our design makes it very intuitive with no file menus, large icons and macros that walk users through complex processes without them knowing it. We put a lot of effort into our security design to make it the most secure exchange system on the market.
We are the only company in our space that offers an insurance policy against a breach. Many hospitals, including Chicago, have paid millions in fines. They would be protected with our software. This is part of customer service of delivering the promise of our pitch. We know we are the most progressive in delivering complete solutions that reduce healthcare costs and improve efficiencies in healthcare. That motivates us every day.
What is “success” or “successful” for you?
When we started Nautilus Medical, we based our success on how much money we could make and what our top line revenue looked like. After becoming more strategy focused and building an install base, we started to see that we had an opportunity to affect health care cost and ultimately save lives if we could get enough of our software in the right hands. This was a significant shift in thinking since we are judged by revenue by investors and potential investors.
We know that if we impact healthcare in a positive manner and make the lives of those using our software from techs to patients, we have been successful. Creating impact will create significant value, even if the top line does not reflect it. When we hear stories from institutions and patients about success stories they experienced with our software, we take pride in being a part of it.
Last year, Cleveland Clinic needed to send a cardiology study to another site for a trauma case. We helped them get set up and transferred the study in a matter of minutes which saved the patient. Those stories keep us coming to work every day knowing we are doing a good thing.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.NautilusMedical.com; www.MatrixRay.com
- Phone: 847-852-1814
- Email: info@nautilusmedical.com
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nautilus.med/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/nautilusmedical
- Other: https://www.linkedin.com/company/nautilus-medical
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