Here are 13 recent news updates on major health IT and technology companies:
1. Apple and Aetna are joining forces to build an iPhone and Apple Watch app that will reward Aetna members for meeting health goals such as regularly exercising or getting enough sleep each night.
2. Apple released earnings results for the first quarter of its 2019 fiscal year, posting a 5 percent drop in revenue — marking the company's first revenue decline during a holiday season in more than 10 years.
3. Shareholders have dropped three class-action lawsuits against athenahealth over the proposed sale of the company.
4. Epic won the No. 1 spot on KLAS Research's ranking of overall software suites for the ninth consecutive year.
5. Greenway Health, a health IT and services provider, named Kali Durgampudi its chief technology and innovation officer.
6. Aetna, Anthem, Health Care Service Corp., PNC Bank and IBM unveiled a new collaborative blockchain project designed to improve transparency and interoperability in healthcare.
7. A former IBM executive has alleged that company superiors told her not to comply with a request from a federal agency, according to sworn testimony from a class-action lawsuit reported by ProPublica.
8. Livongo Health, a digital health startup aimed at supporting people with chronic conditions, acquired behavioral health solutions provider myStrength.
9. Meditech is adding a voice assistant from Nuance Communications and embedding data and analytics tools from Arcadia.io into Expanse, its web-based EHR.
10. Peter Lee, corporate vice president of Microsoft Healthcare, discussed why he initially thought he had made a "career-ending move" after accepting the role to lead Microsoft's healthcare strategy.
11. The Pill Club, an online prescription and at-home delivery service for contraception, raised $51 million — including an investment from Alphabet's venture capital arm — to expand its business.
12. Alphabet's life sciences subsidiary Verily plans to expand its work with healthcare startups.
13. Zocdoc, a service that allows patients to schedule medical appointments online, is scrapping its subscription model and opting to charge providers using a per-booking fee.