Amazon Vies With Medical Supply Brokers for Hospital Business

Amazon Inc.'s push into the hospital supply business will test the current assumption that health clinics need professional intermediaries to help them negotiate prices.

Hospitals and clinics routinely use group purchasing organizations, or GPOs, to help them negotiate discounts with manufacturers, distributors, and other vendors. Health business insiders agree that Amazon will eventually tilt the balance between health-care providers and GPOs, but they expect the liaison business to evolve in response.

One hospital system, Washington-based Summit Pacific Medical Center, saw significant savings by working directly with an Amazon subsidiary. “When we started to implement Amazon Business, we had a dedicated ...