When Epic initially announced its app store in February, it was branded "App Exchange." Now, possibly as little as one month out from launch, Epic has rebranded its new initiative "App Orchard," according to a trademark filing.
At the American Medical Informatics Association's annual symposium in San Francisco on Monday, Epic's interoperability director Peter Verona announced the change and that the app store should be live sometime in the next couple of months, according to a MedCity report.
Epic's app store will provide third parties and external developers with the opportunity to build applications that run on the company's software infrastructure. In a February report, a representative of Epic suggested the new initiative may help change some of the stigma around the company's closed-off image. Although the company does not universally abstain from interoperability coalitions and efforts, it does not participate in the major initiatives that many of its competitors and peers partake in, such as the Commonwell Alliance.
Epic will have a review process in place to screen apps submitted to its "orchard" before making them available to customers, according to MedCity.