Modernizing Medicine To Add 800 Jobs In County’s Biggest Corporate Expansion Since 2009
In the largest corporate expansion deal Palm Beach County has seen since 2009, Boca Raton health care technology company Modernizing Medicine has pledged to hire more than 800 new employees and invest $15 million in the local economy in the next five years.
Dozens gathered at the company’s headquarters on FAU Boulevard for the announcement, bookended by remarks from local public officials and Gov. Rick Scott.
“There’s just not many companies in the world growing as fast as Modernizing Medicine,” Scott said. “And if you’re a governor running on a jobs platform, you love people who create new jobs.”
Dan Cane co-founded ModMed in 2010 with dermatologist Dr. Michael Sherling with the intent to simplify the day-to-day work of physician groups. The company made a name for itself in the vibrant health care segment of technology by creating a cloud-based electronic health record software that adapts to individual clients’ routine tasks to best suit their needs.
Since nabbing $231 million in investment capital from New York private equity firm Warburg Pincus in May, ModMed has also begun expansion into telemedicine, with plans to target specialty practices, such as dermatology.
All told, the 550-person company has raised more than $321 million to date, with revenue swelling beyond the $100 million mark. This week’s incentive deal, brokered among state, county and local agencies, brings an additional $6 million.
Per the incentives package, ModMed is expected to invest millions into the economy with a second Boca HQ at the Boca Raton Innovation Campus and create 838 jobs with average annual wages between about $55,000 and $65,000.
“For comparison, the average Palm Beach County resident makes about $50,000 per year,” said Kelly Smallridge, president of the Palm Beach County Business Development Board, which helped broker the deal. “The expansion of technology-based companies in Palm Beach reflects a new era for both the county and the field of economic development. Innovative firms such as ModMed have helped transform public perception of the community, traditionally viewed almost exclusively as a leisure destination. They also reflect a shift in how economic growth is measured. Long gone are the days when you’d get a 50,000-square-foot user hiring 500 people. Now we’re getting 30,000-square-foot users, or smaller, hiring maybe 50 to 100 people. That’s forcing us to shift our thinking. If you just count jobs, you could bring in average jobs with average wages. Or you can focus on really transforming your economy by bringing innovation-based companies.”
For his part, Cane is optimistic about the role innovation – and ModMed‘s innovation, in particular – will play in bolstering business.
“Technology can be used to transform industries and automate and eliminate jobs, but only human beings can innovate, create concepts, revolutionize industries,” Cane said. “And health care is one of the most challenging industries. So if we can do a good job of bending the needle, the payout for this country could be tremendous.”
The last time a Palm Beach County company expanded to this scale was in 2009 when cosmetic manufacturer Oxygen Development secured a $22.5 million government loan and pledged to add 400 jobs in five years.
Source: SFBJ
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