Kardinal assists Cerballiance in digitizing and optimizing its business. The network of medical labs optimizes its home blood collection planning thanks to Kardinal’s software solution.

Nicolas Garnier, Director of Customer Service at Cerballiance, answered our questions about the implementation of this project.

Kardinal: Hello Nicolas, can you introduce yourself?

Nicolas Garnier: Hello, my name is Nicolas Garnier, I am the Director of Customer Service at Cerballiance, part of the Cerba Healthcare group. My job is to create the best customer service policy and implement innovative services for our patients as well as technological and digital innovations.

K: Can you introduce Cerballiance to us?

NG: The Cerballiance network is composed of more than 500 labs throughout France. It is part of the Cerba Healthcare group which is also active in other countries and business units such as Luxembourg, Belgium, Italy and in some African countries.

K: What were the challenges that motivated Cerballiance to start this project with Kardinal?

NG: As part of the Cerba Healthcare group’s strategic plan, digitalization is one of the major transformations that every company must undergo, especially in our medical labs, where digitalization is already playing a major role. Digitalization enhances and transforms our relationship with patients: it improves the patient experience, but also operational efficiency. The project with Kardinal covers both these issues.

K: How will the digitalization of your business benefit you?

NG: Digitization and algorithms will allow us to cut out tasks with little added value and redirect our teams and employees to higher added-value activities. The objective for the Cerba Healthcare group is to roll out these transformations to other business units and other industries in Belgium, Luxembourg and Africa, which will benefit from the innovations implemented in the Cerballiance network.

K: How did it go with the implementation of the project with Kardinal?

NG: We started the project of digitizing our home management with Kardinal a little over a year ago. What I really appreciated about Kardinal was the startup mindset. Obviously, it is a company that is growing but they have successfully preserved this start-up mindset, this agile approach, and the search for performance and results. At Cerba Healthcare, we usually say that we are a big company but with an entrepreneurial attitude, and we fully share this view with Kardinal.

K: What are the opportunities of this project in the Cerballiance network?

NG: We remain vigilant to the feedback from the field and the statistics to keep a close eye on the operational efficiency of the system we have implemented. We will obviously continue to roll out the system in more labs based on this feedback. We have several French and foreign regions that manage “homes” and are interested in this system. We hope that Kardinal’s solution will also be able to meet these needs.

K: What is, in your opinion, the greatest added value of the digitalization of your business?

NG: Cerballiance and the Cerba Healthcare group operate in the medical biology and healthcare industries, which have traditionally been a little behind in terms of digital transformation compared to other fields of activity. The healthcare industry is undergoing major changes and rapid digitalization. The current Covid crisis has also triggered this transformation. In the future, we will be able to manage such health crises much more easily thanks to digitalization because, strangely enough, it allows us to refocus on the human aspect. It is precisely because we have digital tools, that we have algorithms and artificial intelligence, that we can put humans back in their rightful position in our operations.