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COMS is sprinting to big gains in software
SPECIAL SECTION
UNIVERSITY CIRCLE BUILDING A NEIGHBORHOOD
Broadview Heights company has more than doubled customer base since 2013 By CHUCK SODER csoder@crain.com
ROUNDING OUT A COMMUNITY
ALSO INSIDE
AREA’S HOME TO MORE THAN INSTITUTIONS By TIMOTHY MAGAW tmagaw@crain.com
or lack of a better phrase, life’s come full circle — in the Circle — for Allen Ford. He was born in 1928 at University Hospitals, and today, the 86-year-old retired Standard Oil exec resides at Judson Manor, a senior housing community in the heart of University Circle on Cleveland’s East Side. In between, Ford served on the boards at many of the Circle’s anchor institutions, including UH, Case Western Reserve University and the Western Reserve Historical Society. “There’s a lot of happy coincidence there,” Ford said. So, Ford saw first-hand University Circle’s transformation into Cleveland’s cultural and medical epicenter over much of the last century. More specifically, since he moved into Judson a decade ago, he has observed the Circle’s evolution into a more complete neighborhood — one ripe with desirable housing stock, a grocery store, modern dining options and a dense enough population to support those amenities. But for Ford, what makes University Circle a complete neighborhood isn’t so much the bricks and mortar, but the diversity. “It’s a marvelous center for several neighborhoods,” Ford said. “It has an incredibly diverse gathering here.” What makes a neighborhood is a bit of a subjective question. Some say it’s the people or a sense of community, while others say it would be the physical infrastructure and the ease of daily living. That said, most people agree that University Circle is a complete neighborhood or at least on its way to becoming one, though perhaps not in the same sense as others in Cleveland. Technically, University
F
WHO IS LIVING IN, AND MOVING TO, THE CIRCLE PAGE 13
If you’re a nursing home, history suggests that you will quintuple the money you spend on software from COMS Interactive. And that’s the worst-case scenario, according to customer data generated by the Broadview Heights company. Skilled nursing facilities are flocking to COMS — one of the fastest-growing technology companies in Northeast Ohio — to buy software that helps them take care of patients with multiple medical conditions. Today, COMS serves roughly 2,000 facilities, up from 850 in June 2013. The company’s strategy is to get big fast: COMS is pushing hard to win customers now, while the market is hot, according to CEO Ed Tromczynski. “For us, it’s a sprint to get into as many places as we can, as fast as we can,” he said. The 6-year-old company has won over customers and investors. A year ago, COMS — which stands for Clinical Outcomes Management Systems — raised a $21 See COMS, page 7
ROLE OF UNIVERSITY CIRCLE INC. AND ANCHOR INSTITUTIONS PAGES 14-15
JOBS DOWN THIS MONTH
DEVELOPMENT EFFORTS START MOVING UPWARD, OUT PAGE 16
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See NEIGHBORHOOD, page 19
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REAL ESTATE
RISK MANAGEMENT By selling most of its Tower City assets, Forest City Enterprises is attempting to reduce uncertainty in its $9 billion portfolio ■ Page 5
Entire contents © 2014 by Crain Communications Inc. Vol. 35, No. 33