On the same day, both Harvard Business Review and Adam Fein exposed the reality of consolidation within the health care system.

Harvard Business Review predicts that the pandemic will speed up this process. “Given the financial difficulty that many providers have suffered during the pandemic, this trend is likely to continue, reducing competition and increasing prices.”

It seems like the big players are riding the wave (for now, at least).

What I’m wondering is: is this the ultimate truth (big guys get to have all the fun), or is this the perfect opportunity for a new guy (not necessarily little—just new) to creep in and make it reign?

Scott Galloway points out that our health care industry is the industry with the lowest net promoter score (basically, it’s a broken system—as if we needed someone to tell us this). Therefore, the health care industry is ripe for incumbents to be replaced by newcomers.

Generally speaking, smaller companies are more nimble than larger companies. Will the sheer size of a large conglomeration inhibit itself to react/adjust to the borderline-prophetic Great Dispersion as suggested by Scott Galloway? This could very well be the perfect opportunity for a newcomer who wants to eat the pie (not just a slice…but all of it).

To put all of this in a different way, here are 2 questions: (1) Who is this [the vertical and horizontal integrations] for? (2) Who will this be for? Hint: many people have the answer to the first question; the second question cannot be Googled.

To put all of this in a 3rd way: Seth Godin says, ’empathy is at the heart of design.’