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Technology Stocks : HAXS - Health Axis -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Don Hand who wrote (28)	3/31/2000 7:45:00 AM
From: Don Hand	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 124

Interesting article. Partners are partners of HAXS. Does HAXS have the infrastructure to take on WebMD ? How about if IBM came on to help ? accessatlanta.com News of potential rival hits Healtheon/WebMD shares Mark Clothier - Staff Friday, March 31, 2000 News that six insurance companies are discussing an alliance that may compete with Healtheon/WebMD drove shares of the Atlanta-based firm to a 52-week low Thursday. The companies --- Aetna U.S. Healthcare, Cigna, WellPoint Health Systems, Oxford Health Plans, Foundation Health Systems and PacifiCare Health Systems --- are tentatively calling the new venture MedUnite. The effort could pose a threat to Healtheon/WebMD, which is trying to link doctors, insurance companies and patients using the Internet. The news helped send Healtheon/WebMD shares down almost 16 percent. They closed at $25.82, down $4.86. An Aetna spokeswoman said the insurers are considering ways to link doctors and hospitals with insurance companies through the Internet. That means that both consumers and medical professionals could handle some chores online instead of on the telephone. "Aetna U.S. Healthcare is in discussion with a number of other major insurers," said Joyce Oberdorf, Aetna spokeswoman. "We are looking at this as something highly promising. "Everyone is pretty much in agreement as to the inefficiencies in the health care industry," she said. "This is an effort to address those inefficiencies." Jeff Arnold, Healtheon/WebMD's chief executive, said the online health care industry is large enough for competition. Arnold said Healtheon's explosive growth-through-acquisition strategy will slow anyone from entering the market in as large a manner as Healtheon. "We've made $16 billion worth of acquisitions. When the deals close, we'll have 3,000 direct-sales people. We have 7 million consumers coming to our Web site each month. We process 2 billion transactions. The technology took us four years and 1,000 engineers to develop," he said. "And that's just the infrastructure. "Clearly, we think the assets we've assembled are very powerful, and this is a reaction to the things we've done," he said. Jeff Peters, an analyst with Dain Rauscher Wessels, lowered his rating Thursday on Healtheon stock to "neutral" from "strong buy." "This has been building up," he said. "With all the mergers and acquisitions and rumors on consortiums coming in to compete with this company, in the near term the market probably will be more fragmented." Peters said he thinks more competition will enter the market and cloud issues for the potential customers of Healtheon/WebMD's services. "I don't think it's all over for Healtheon. But in the near term there's going to be trouble," he said. "There should be a lot more news of companies coming into the market. But once it all plays out, most will fall by the wayside, and Healtheon will be one of the few left standing."