Recently, Histalk leaked that Ryan Bloom, has left his role as Director of Open Source Development — Healthcare. The post contemplates that Blooms departure might indicate that the Misys commitment to open source has waned. I got Tim Elwell’s permission to repost his thoughts from an email exchange between, him, me and Tim from Histalk. Elwell writes:

Misys plc has no less commitment for open source today than we did when I was hired back in November 2007. Our CEO and Board of Directors are firmly supportive of our mission and have backed that up by doubling their investment in the open source team this fiscal year (which began June 1). To that end, we are looking for experienced Lead Architects and Junior Architects with solid open source development skills. Our initial concentration is on interoperability solutions so folks with a working understanding of healthcare interoperability including Connecting for Health Common Framework, HL-7, CCHIT, HITSP, HISPC, NHIN, IHE, and HIE initiatives are most desirable.

And yes, Ryan Bloom will be leaving Misys. But I believe Ryan is committed to the projects we have started and I expect him to continue to contribute in some capacity. That’s the neat thing about open source; you are no tied to a company but linked to a cause. Ryan taught me that open source developers tend to work on projects that “scratch their own itch”. We came together to solve some healthcare problems and are all committed to doing that. So watch for Ryan; I don’t think he’ll be far from the same projects that Misys will continue to support. Additionally, we are looking at filling Ryan’s role which is Director of Open Source Solutions. The role will include a fair amount of travel and customer interaction because unless you understand the problems, you can’t solve them. A brief description of the position follows:

To develop and maintain the high-level design and requirements plan for the overall logical and technical IT architecture in support of health information exchange (HIE) and interoperability models for healthcare including the support of accommodating service and support business models. This individual will provide technical leadership, project management and consulting across the organization and has participated and successfully contributed in a recognized open source community. The individual will participate in key strategic decision making down to the project planning level which may include management of key product development activities. The individual will gain organizational and community commitment for all high-level infrastructure plans and initiate and participate in projects to evaluate technologies and methods for implementing these plans within and outside of the open source community.

My hope is to locate the position in NY but I am flexible on the location provided we get the right talent.