A Roadmap to the Future of Healthcare in Barco

Abstract

The healthcare market is changing, with technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI) and the increasing use of patient data. In everyday practice, AI will be used as a co-pilot for image interpretation (Beregi, 2019). Additionally, public health records (PHRs) offer a tremendous opportunity to generate support in reducing costs, improving health outcomes for populations, and improving the experience of care for patients and their families (Ford, 2017). These are just two developments that will have a huge impact on the needs and the roles of the patients, doctors and managers and therefore their needs concerning Barco's products. Moreover, legislation might change, other interesting markets might emerge and competitors might take the competitive advantage. What is the most profitable, most viable and most sustainable future for Barco in this changing landscape? A company like Barco cannot simply change to get to this future. There might be a need to collaborate between departments, collaborate with other companies, different jobs, change of processes. These changes all have their own timings and relevance and they should be defined carefully beforehand. When plans and processes are created for the 'near' future (one or two years), Barco managers and employees can execute these. It is different when these plans must be made for a longer term. This is because over longer periods of time things can change drastically. What was once created out of a certain vision can now be completely different because there are different employees/managers working on the project or the context has changed. This creates the need for a visually comprehensive overview of the future. Not only does this need to be communicated to the top-management level, but also to the relevant departments and stakeholders. In summary: For Barco to be at their full potential they will need to plan their future carefully and be able to communicate that to all relevant stakeholders. When planning for further in the future than a year or two a roadmap helps in communicating the essence of a project, department or even an organisation. As defined by Simonse in 2017: "In essence, a design roadmap offers a tactical plan on design innovations to turn a future vision into a reality." It can provide a quick overview of the general plans, addressed values and overall strategy for people that are not yet involved. Besides creating an overview, a roadmap supports the innovation strategy of an organisation (Simonse, 2017). For the healthcare department, the diagnostic imaging products in particular, I created a future vision and a Design Roadmap. The future vision describes the desired future within 10 years. The roadmap describes relevant business models, user values, markets, target groups, products, technologies, resources and competitors towards the future vision.