Health IT company Rendia has been acquired by Ohio-based PatientPoint

The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad may be a thing of the past, but Charm City and the Buckeye State have a new link thanks to Cincinnati-based PatientPoint’s recently announced acquisition of fellow patient engagement-related software and content creator Rendia.

The deal, which the two companies announced on Wednesday, lets Rendia maintain its name, presence and 29-person staff in Baltimore’s Federal Hill neighborhood. CEO Smitha Gopal, who will take on a new role as PatientPoint’s EVP of subscription and procedure-based specialties, said the acquisition came about after a mutual connection suggested about a year ago that she might love PatientPoint’s work.

“A partnership or any sort of relationship with another company really needs to make sense for both parties; often, in the past, it hasn’t made sense,” Gopal told Technical.ly about past offers from other companies. “I think that we all kind of agreed that there was something there. We’re both companies operating at the point of care. We’re both focused on improving patient outcomes via information, via better education — because, when patients really understand the pathology of their care, or they understand why a medication is so important and why they should stay adherent to it, it really makes an impact.”

Rendia, which was founded as Eyemaginations in 1999 before rebranding six years ago, produces software and related content that eye care and ear, nose and throat providers use to better communicate with patients and improve their outcomes. PatientPoint deploys its own patient relations platform across nearly 140,000 partnerships with healthcare providers of various specialties, per a press release. Its CEO, Mike Collette, cited Rendia’s “highly flexible technology platform and provider portal,” as well as its anatomical simulation capabilities and customer base, as making the smaller company “an ideal target” for his.

“We also think there is a lot of growth potential for the business through leveraging PatientPoint’s strong pharma and consumer healthcare relationships so that products can be offered at no cost to practices as an additional option to Rendia’s current subscription model,” Collette added in an email to Technical.ly.

Rendia’s staff. (Courtesy photo)

Rendia will now operate as a subsidiary of PatientPoint, which employs around 600 workers throughout its offices in Cincinnati; Chicago; Nashville; New York City; Tampa; Little Rock, Arkansas and beyond via remote roles. Gopal and Collette both declined to disclose the financial terms of the acquisition, which is now complete.

Going forward, Collette said that PatientPoint plans to use Rendia’s own portal “to accelerate expansion into other specialties and markets” that could benefit from the latter company’s content specialties. He anticipates this expansion taking place next year.

“PatientPoint is also very committed to investing in the Rendia business to power its continued growth,” Collette said. “We believe there is a lot of upside growth potential for the business.”

Gopal, for her part, hopes that Rendia’s internal timelines will accelerate given its access to PatientPoint’s increased resources and nationwide field team. Certain aspects of the platforms’ integration — for instance, Gopal noted that both companies offer content-based solutions for doctors offices’ waiting rooms that are “really different” from one another — still have yet to be hammered out.

“The custom content creation and digital anatomy tools that we have to help doctors on the fly, they can visualize for patients as they’re explaining either their findings or their recommended next steps,” Gopal said. “Those are the things that were most attractive about our platform to the PatientPoint team, so I would love to take those features and products, and just accelerate them further.”