General Electric, more intimately tied in with government than nearly any other company, rolled out a new intiative this week, called “healthymagination.” That odd name draws a parallel to GE’s 2005 initiative “ecomagination.”
Like ecomagination, healthymagination held its launch event not at corporate headquarters in Greenwich, Conn., but here in D.C. The Beltway-centrism of these GE programs is telling. For ecomagination, it’s obvious: the only way to make money off of solar and wind power–and especially off of greenhouse gas credits–is by also obtaining or preserving subsidies and regulations that create demand for such investments. The story may be similar for healthymagination.
President Obama is calling for a greater government role in health care. He has proposed allowing all Americans onto a government-run plan that would compete with private insurers, and he has also proposed government cost-containment measures. This could be worrisome to GE, which makes expensive diagnostic equipment. Here’s a line from a Bloomberg News piece in March discussing Obama’s cost containment efforts:
The measure may hinder equipment sales that accounted for more than half of GE’s $17.4 billion in health-care sales last year, or about 5 percent of overall revenue. The imaging unit at Siemens generated 262 million euros ($328.7 million) in profit in the fiscal first quarter, a fifth of net income, the manufacturer reported Jan. 27.
And here is how the New York Times explains healthymagination:
General Electric is shifting the strategy in its $17 billion-a-year health equipment and technology business, seeking to broaden its reach with more lower-cost products.
Healthymagination seems to be taking at least some of its cues from the White House.
