FRISCO, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Valify Solutions Group, the first Purchased Services group purchasing organization (GPO) for healthcare, today announced that Les Popiolek has been appointed CEO of Valify and Valify Solutions Group. Popiolek replaces Chris Heckler who announced his decision to pursue new opportunities after seven years leading the technology and analytics platform, and the GPO.
“Les is ideally suited to continue the ongoing success of Valify and Valify Solutions Group due to his deep understanding of the needs of providers and technology subscribers and his extensive experience in purchased services spend management,” said Shelly Workman, senior vice president of supply chain operations for HCA Healthcare. “Les’ experience includes leadership roles in data, analytics, procurement and sourcing. He is a strong leader whose vision and guidance will exponentially contribute to the continued successful trajectory of Valify and Valify Solutions Group.”
Prior to serving as Valify’s chief operating officer, Popiolek held prominent roles in healthcare purchasing for over 25 years. He was part of the conceptualization and startup of Texas-based Broadlane GPO and the launch of BroadLink, one of the industry's early B2B e-commerce exchanges. As chief technology officer of Broadlane, Popiolek created and led a centralized, outsourced national procurement center. Following the acquisition of Broadlane in 2010 by MedAssets, Popiolek led the integration of GPO portfolios totaling $35 billion in annual customer spend.
“I am honored to assume this position and excited to lead Valify and Valify Solutions Group,” said Popiolek. “I look forward to upholding the Valify legacy of unprecedented opportunities for identifying savings in purchased services and building on that momentum through Valify Solutions Group by delivering new ways to capture deeper savings and expanding spend management best practices.”
Chris Heckler steps down after nearly 20 years in the healthcare purchased services space and having served as director of purchased services for a Texas regional purchasing coalition. “Under Chris’ entrepreneurial vision and leadership, Valify quickly became a best-in-class spend analytics service and benchmarking technology platform, empowering providers to categorize, monitor, benchmark and source for this spend,” Workman added. “I thank Chris for his many outstanding contributions to Valify and wish him the best in his new endeavors.”
Heckler commented, “Growing Valify into the industry leading technology solution that has helped thousands of hospitals and then expanding our solution to create Valify Solutions Group has been a profound privilege. I am incredibly proud of all that the Valify team has accomplished, particularly advancing healthcare purchased services spend management into the arena of data-driven decision making which was once considered impossible.”
About Valify
Valify, an affiliated company of HCA Healthcare, is the only healthcare cost management company exclusively dedicated to managing purchased services expense. Valify’s web-based technology platform uses proprietary machine learning algorithms which allow organizations to quickly identify and manage savings opportunities in over 1,200 purchased services categories. The Valify technology categorizes spend data, identifies savings opportunities and benchmarks against a database of over $460 billion in categorized spend. With a leading end-to-end cost management solution, Valify helps thousands of hospitals proactively manage expenses, increase staff productivity and realize significant savings.
About Valify Solutions Group
Valify Solutions Group is the first tech-enabled GPO exclusively dedicated to purchased services for healthcare. VSG leverages the largest data-driven market intelligence from $460 billion in spend categorized to generate savings for members and provides a comprehensive pre-negotiated purchased services contract portfolio. Members may access custom contracting specialists, proven spend analytics technology, and expert advisory services to exponentially enhance savings beyond contract utilization.
