A statewide healthcare system with 12 hospitals and over 100 locations paying over $2.5M annually for secure messaging with under 10% workforce adoption and a 5% annual CPI increase.
Telmac worked with the vendor to develop a first of its kind unlimited license model, implemented a zero-cost re-adoption campaign, and delivered 67% term savings, reducing OPEX to under $950K per year, and locked CPI at 0%.
Statewide Hospital System | 27,000 Employees | 12 Hospitals | 200 Outpatient Facilities | Secure Clinical Messaging Platform
The health system was paying over $2.5M annually for a secure clinical messaging platform — but less than 10% of its workforce had actually adopted it. The vendor was charging a per-seat model against a headcount that reflected the organization’s full employee base, not its actual users.
Simultaneously, the vendor was imposing a 5% annual CPI increase on a platform that was, by any measure, failing to deliver adoption. The health system was paying more every year for a platform that was largely unused — and had no contractual mechanism to challenge either the pricing model or the CPI obligation.
The existing per-seat pricing model charged for the full workforce regardless of actual usage. With under 10% adoption, the organization was paying for approximately 90% of its seats without anyone using them — a direct and quantifiable overpayment.
The vendor was increasing its pricing by 5% annually — compounding the overpayment on an already-inflated base cost. Without CPI protection provisions in the existing contract, the organization had no mechanism for challenging the increase.
Non-adoption at 90% of the workforce wasn’t just a cost issue — it was a clinical governance issue. A secure messaging platform that most of the organization doesn’t use isn’t delivering its core function: secure, compliant clinical communications.
A per-seat licensing model replaced with a first-of-its-kind unlimited license. CPI locked at 0%. A zero-cost re-adoption campaign deployed. $3M in total cost reduction.
ISP contract renegotiations missed in 2025, down from 27 the year prior
Realized savings over three years on IT & voice cost mitigation
ISP contract renegotiations missed in 2025, down from 27 the year prior
This engagement required Telmac to address two problems simultaneously: a pricing model that was structurally disconnected from actual usage, and an adoption gap that was compounding the overpayment while undermining the platform’s clinical value. Both needed to be resolved for the outcome to be financially and operationally durable.
Paying $2.5M for a platform that 90% of your workforce doesn’t use is an adoption problem masquerading as a cost problem — and vice versa. Resolving only one leaves the other unaddressed. Telmac resolved both.
Telmac designed and implemented a zero-cost re-adoption campaign to address the 95% over-subscription from non-adoption — establishing the platform as a genuinely used clinical communications tool and delivering the clinical value the organization had been paying for but not receiving.
When you’re paying for 100% of seats and using 10%, the problem isn’t the platform — it’s the pricing model and governance. An unlimited license structure aligns the vendor’s incentive to the organization’s actual usage. That’s how re-adoption becomes part of the commercial conversation.
A vendor imposing 5% annual CPI increases on a platform with 90% non-adoption has an indefensible position. The leverage to challenge it exists — it just requires the expertise to find it and the willingness to use it.
Low-adoption platforms with high per-seat costs are a common and addressable pattern in health system IT spend. A diagnostic conversation maps the overpayment — and the path to restructuring it.
