The teleradiology market is entering a pivotal phase as multiple growth catalysts align. Growth in the teleradiology market is not unheard of, with the trend of outsourcing intensifying annually in the last few years. Nevertheless, with growing volumes, increased provider consolidation and private equity investment, workforce challenges alongside increased competition from third-party vendors, and native exploration into next-generation solutions, the market is at an inflection point.
Amy Thompson of Signify Research.
Sentiment from the market represents a clear influx of new requests for proposals (RFPs) and IT tenders in the short term. Legacy IT solutions are no longer tolerated by teleradiology providers, with a willingness to rip and replace solutions if it doesn’t meet the need.
The demand for scalable, intelligent, and efficient systems is creating a microcosm of atypical growth. Which vendors are positioned to take advantage? What must incumbents do to prevent losing their foothold in a high-growth market? How will self-developed solutions challenge the market opportunity?
Evolution of teleradiology provider needs
The solution requirements for teleradiology providers are evolving rapidly. Providers are evaluating growth strategies and investment priorities, alongside the opportunity of next-generation technology such as agentic AI and a higher impetus on operational AI to drive efficiency to enhance core business areas.
Strategic growth for teleradiology providers typically aligns with exploring opportunities to diversify portfolios. There are budding markets outside of the U.S., U.K., AUSNZ, and Western Europe, including the Middle East, South Africa, and pockets of Latin America. Beyond geographical expansion, there are opportunities to evaluate additional services -- either within teleradiology, expanding from overnight reads to routine, for example, or into emerging specialties such as telepathology or teleultrasound.
Irrespective of the diversification, pressure will be placed on a provider's existing workforce and IT infrastructure. As a result, providers are actively seeking modern IT stacks that can facilitate the adoption of next-generation solutions and tools, such as large language models (LLMs) and generative AI tools alongside clinical AI. The highest priority for these new tools is automation and efficiency. RSNA 2025 demonstrated a range of concepts, both from third-party vendors and teleradiology providers, including draft reporting, sophisticated worklists, and enhancements to drive greater support to the radiologist. Cloud is also strongly favored, as it promotes scalability, security, and reliability.
Imaging IT vendors strategic focus
Competitive positioning in the teleradiology market will come to a head in the short term. Beyond incumbents in the teleradiology market, other imaging IT vendors are witnessing the growth potential to not only support revenue growth but also mitigate the competitive risk observed in core customer segments, i.e., academic and integrated delivery network (IDN) market.
The cloud-based enterprise imaging platform that most top 10 vendors have been developing in the last few years can be adapted to meet the needs of the teleradiology market with relative ease. The main challenge for vendors is aligned to the go-to-market strategy and how the product is bundled together, with considerations on how to create a platform that is more streamlined and flexible to the teleradiology needs. Products in the hospital market such as the vendor-neutral archive (VNA), multispecialty capability, and image exchange are not required. Conversely, there is a heightened focus on workflow and a critical need for more intelligent and federated solutions to manage the diverse and geographically disperse workforce. Importantly, it’s not only the product, but also a high requirement to align to a software-as-a-service (SaaS) or operational expense (OpEx) business model.
There are two types of incumbent strategies, one that will emphasis the price point and seek to remain cost-competitive to retain and win business. For those vendors focused on the mid- to large providers, price will not be enough. Continued innovation, leveraging the installed base and key partners to drive R&D roadmaps will be critical, importantly, the roadmap doesn’t exclusively require native development, seamlessly integrating best of breed partners will be effective.
Commercialization of self-developed solutions
Teleradiology providers developing their own solutions is not a new trend, with a combination of third-party and native solutions highly common. What has witnessed a dynamic shift is the intensity of this strategy and providers commercialization of platforms more widely for the market. For example, vRad has always leveraged its own IT platform, but this year the provider officially commercialized it and demonstrated the technology at RSNA 2025.
This trend has accelerated the last 12 months for two main reasons. Firstly, the infrastructure and toolkits that hyperscalers are developing are lowering the threshold for providers to invest and develop cloud-native architecture, which will also support the adoption of next-generation tools and LLMs. Secondly, limited new product announcements from incumbents, beyond iterations and refinements to features, focused to the teleradiology market. Investment from imaging IT vendors have aligned more to the hospital market. This has started to shift in the last six months, including new entrants such as Konica Minolta launching a dedicated Exa Teleradiology solution in partnership with NewVue.
Native solutions are increasingly beyond single product and evolved towards entire platforms, including additional features for draft reporting, clinical and operational AI. This creates a holistic offering that can directly compete with imaging IT vendor portfolios, with the advantage of “build by teleradiology, for teleradiology” ethos. Although this ethos can be a double-edge sword. The reality of selling an IT platform to a competitor in the reading market will be a challenge. Efficiency and performance will ultimately be what determines the landscape in this market segment, with the element of competition reduced if it could prove substantial improvements.
How do you position for growth in teleradiology
Beyond the undoubtable opportunity, the market segment will not be easy to dominate with a dedicated incumbent landscape, alongside the increased complexity from providers investment and commercialization of self-developed IT solutions. A strategy made comparatively easier with the infrastructure and tools available from cloud vendors, alongside advancements in technology.
This two-pronged competition will accelerate product evolution, as tailorable AI-enabled workflow orchestration emerges as a key differentiator, while cloud-hosting and integrated reporting capabilities become baseline requirements.
Evidence of efficiency and productivity, a clear strategic roadmap to develop and integrate next-generation technology and solutions alongside timeliness to market will be essential to capitalize on this market. Importantly, there will always a balance to consider when evaluating priorities for third-party vendors. Self-developed tools will also influence this market segment, with some elements typically owned by the teleradiology provider. Vendors will need to assess where the greatest value can be added, double down and emphasis this for competitive value.
The next three years will redefine the teleradiology segment, solutions available, and the competitive landscape. Does your strategy align to maximize the opportunity?
Amy Thompson is a principal analyst at Signify Research, an independent supplier of market intelligence and consultancy to the global healthcare technology industry.
The comments and observations expressed do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Auntminnie.com or AuntMinnieEurope.com, nor should they be construed as an endorsement or admonishment of any particular vendor, analyst, industry consultant, or consulting group.
