Why We Created Orchestral
Ian McCrae, Founder
Twenty years ago, I watched a doctor spend forty minutes hunting through three different systems to find one patient’s complete medical history. The patient waited. The doctor got frustrated. Important details got missed.
That moment stuck with me through two decades of building healthcare technology at Orion Health. We helped 150 million patients across 15 countries access better care through connected health systems. But even as we succeeded, the fundamental problem remained: healthcare generates more data than any other industry but uses it less effectively than most.
The problem nobody wants to talk about
Healthcare organizations spend 60% of their data budgets on integration work. Not insights. Not patient care improvements. Just getting data to talk to other data.
I’ve seen brilliant data scientists waste months trying to make generic platforms understand how healthcare actually works. I’ve watched IT teams build custom solutions that break every time someone updates the underlying system. I’ve sat in too many meetings where hospital administrators explain why their latest data project is six months behind schedule and 200% over budget.
The industry accepts this as normal. It shouldn’t be.
Healthcare data deserves better
After selling Orion Health to Healwell AI, I had a choice. Retirement was an option. So was consulting. Both felt like giving up on the problem that started my career twenty years earlier.
Then I nearly died. Seriously, I nearly died. AI and data played a big role in saving my life. I became more determined than ever to ensure as many people could access what I could.
So we decided to build what healthcare data platforms should have been from the beginning.
Not another generic tool that requires months of customization. Not another consulting engagement that promises everything and delivers integration nightmares. A purpose-built platform that understands healthcare from day one.
Healthcare budgets shouldn’t go to fuelling armies of consultants.
We built what we wished we had
Orchestral exists because healthcare professionals deserve technology that works the way healthcare actually operates. Our Health Intelligence Platform handles HL7 messages, FHIR resources, and clinical workflows without requiring teams to become data engineers first.
Every pipeline prepares data for AI interpretation because we know that’s where healthcare is heading. Every security control respects patient privacy because that’s non-negotiable. Every integration point connects with existing systems because ripping out working infrastructure makes no sense.
We didn’t build Orchestral to be the smartest platform in the room. We built it to be the most useful.
Twenty years of lessons, built in
The healthcare industry taught us what works and what doesn’t. Generic platforms don’t understand clinical workflows. Custom builds take too long and cost too much. Half-measures create more problems than they solve.
Those lessons are embedded in every component of the Orchestral platform. The pre-built Health Data Model that acts as a universal translator. The configurable pipelines that handle messy real-world data formats. The AI infrastructure that’s ready for whatever comes next.
Most importantly, the understanding that healthcare technology should amplify human expertise, not complicate it.
Healthcare’s AI moment
We’re at the beginning of an AI-driven transformation in healthcare. Organizations that harness this change will deliver better outcomes at lower costs. Those that don’t will struggle to keep up.
But only if the underlying data infrastructure actually works. Only if patient privacy is protected. Only if clinical teams can focus on patients instead of fighting software.
That’s why Orchestral exists. To ensure healthcare organizations succeed in this transformation with technology built specifically for healthcare challenges.
The future we’re building
I’ve spent my career believing that better technology leads to better patient care. That belief drives everything we build at Orchestral.
Healthcare professionals dedicate their lives to helping others. They deserve data platforms that support that mission instead of complicating it. They deserve technology that understands healthcare as well as they do.
That’s what we’ve built. That’s why we get up every morning.
Ready to see your healthcare data actually work for you? Let’s talk about what that looks like for your organization.