It has been a tough five years for private healthcare in Europe. but what was noticeable at Healthcare Europa, the only annual conference for the sector, was the spring in the step of the CEOs of large operators such as BMI, Terveystalo and Euromedic. New web and big data applications are finally proving that they can grow patient numbers by 10% or more, demonstrate and measure quality and improve efficiency. The three things which stood out from this event were, firstly, clear signs that new IT is impacting the sector, secondly, the growing confidence of management teams in private companies that they can deploy this to good effect, and thirdly, a sense that the public sector was often completely incapable of rolling out similar solutions.