InterSystems successfully hosted its flagship READY 2025 Summit in Johannesburg, bringing together healthcare leaders, partners, and innovators from across Africa to explore the future of data-driven healthcare.
The event served as a platform for InterSystems to share key company updates, including the expanding role of its InterSystems IRIS data platform in supporting advanced AI workloads, enhancements to interoperability features, and a continued commitment to investment across the African continent.
“READY 2025 is about more than showcasing technology it is about bringing our community together,” says Henry Adams, country manager for InterSystems South Africa. “The conversations we have had in both Cape Town and Johannesburg showed how Africa can lead with innovation when we put data to work in the right way. From using generative AI with vector search to build the next generation of applications with advanced UX, to focusing on creating solutions that make a measurable difference for users and organisations.”
Data drives everything
A core theme at READY 2025 was the recognition that data underpins every innovation. InterSystems demonstrated how its InterSystems IRIS data platform is evolving to meet this reality, with recent 2025 updates adding native vector search capabilities. This means organisations can now perform semantic queries and retrieval-augmented generation directly within the InterSystems IRIS data platform, unlocking faster insights from both structured and unstructured data without moving information to external systems.
These advances are complemented by generative AI tools built into the IRIS data platform, enabling developers to combine health, financial, and supply chain data with modern AI techniques in a secure, governed environment. In healthcare specifically, explainable AI use cases highlighted how vector search and the InterSystems IRIS data platform for Health can surface similar patient histories, provide transparent recommendations, and support clinicians in delivering more personalised care.
“Data is only powerful when it is usable. With vector search and generative AI now built directly into the IRIS data platform, our customers can move from simply storing information to actively applying it in ways that transform care,” says Gokhan Uluderya of director: product management: data platforms at InterSystems. “For South Africa and the wider continent, this means faster insights, more personalised services, and solutions that reflect the realities of our healthcare systems. It is about turning data into action and action into better outcomes.”
Developing a new generation of applications
READY 2025 showcased how the InterSystems IRIS data platform is providing the foundation for building the next wave of intelligent applications. With embedded generative AI, vector search, and interoperability tools, developers can now design solutions that surpass traditional systems to deliver context-aware, adaptive, and scalable applications tailored to modern demands.
“We are moving into an era where applications must think and adapt just as quickly as the people who use them,” said Mike Fuller, Regional Director of Marketing at InterSystems. “By combining interoperability, AI, and advanced data tools within the IRIS data platform, we are helping our community build a new generation of applications that are faster, more intelligent, and designed for real-world impact. In Africa, this agility is vital as it means healthcare, finance, and public services can innovate without being held back by legacy constraints.”
By unifying data, AI, and application development within a single environment, InterSystems is enabling organisations in Africa to create solutions that are not just faster to deploy but also more resilient and impactful.
“Personalisation is at the heart of the future of healthcare,” said Dr Rami Riman, Director of Clinical and Business Improvements at InterSystems. “Our customers need to be able to personalise and tailor experiences, and we believe that our technology now provides them with a foundation that supports more tailored, context-aware applications, solutions designed for systems, and most importantly for people. By delivering on the promise of personalisation, we are assisting our users to deliver meaningful outcomes for patients, clinicians, and communities.”
Partners, customers, and community
The Summit reaffirmed InterSystems’ commitment to its community of customers and partners, providing a space for collaboration, knowledge-sharing, and co-creation.
Additionally, the programme featured a strong line-up of guest speakers, including Dr Rami Riman, director of clinical and business improvements at InterSystems, who painted a vision of AI in healthcare, and Jane Simmonds, founder and executive director of goGOGOgo, who spoke about the social impact of technology on access to care.
The Partner Pavilion brought together ecosystem collaborators, demonstrating solutions that extend the power of the InterSystems IRIS data platform in interoperability, analytics, and application development.
“What READY 2025 made clear is that innovation is never just about technology; it is also about the community of people, organisations, and ideas that bring it to life. With our partners and customers at the heart of everything we do, InterSystems is proud to be driving healthcare innovation in Africa,” says Adams.