Picis

In 1994, founders Todd Cozzens and Robert Marcus started Picis to tackle a complex problem: digitizing the high-stakes, high-acuity areas of a hospital. They focused on the most critical and data-intensive departments—the emergency room, the operating room, and the intensive care unit. The company’s name, Picis, stands for Perioperative & Intensive Care Information Systems, reflecting this specific mission. The core of the business was creating software that could automate the massive amounts of data generated in these environments. Picis built a suite of products that created a single, continuous patient record across the entire surgical journey, from pre-op to anesthesia and finally to recovery. This automation reduced manual documentation and allowed clinicians to focus more on patient care. A key part of the strategy was being device-agnostic, integrating with over 400 different medical devices to ensure seamless data flow. A significant chapter for Picis began in 2010 when it was acquired by Ingenix, the health information technology subsidiary of UnitedHealth Group. This move was designed to expand Ingenix’s reach into the clinical side of hospitals. However, the ownership story didn't end there. In 2015, Picis was acquired again, this time by N. Harris Computer Corporation, a subsidiary of Constellation Software. Today, Picis operates as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Harris, continuing its focus on providing specialized software for the most critical areas of healthcare in over 400 hospitals worldwide.