Health care at the money dance

Today starts a week-long money dance for health care companies as Thomas Weisel and Bear Stearns hold their annual health care conferences.

Weisel starts things off today in Boston with over 150 companies presenting. Most are small and private, in keeping with the fact this is a venture capital conference.

William Hawkins, the new CEO Medtronic, will be the exemplar of what's possible and the focus of eager business-card wielding entrepreneurs seeking a buy-out. James Surowiecki of The New Yorker will provide the entertainment.

Bear Stearns has even more presenting companies -- over 180 -- and they are (by and large) public. The confab will start Monday at the Grand Hyatt, whose outer shell was the Hotel Commodore when built in 1919. The smell of old money will be everywhere.

Issues of policy and finance will dominate the speeches, with the assembled CEOs doing a stately dance of positioning for the financing season to come. Interesting to note how their logo is a bit of chemical modeling -- big pharma pays the bills here.

My point in all this is to emphasize a little of the size, scope, and competitive power of the health care technology market. In many ways it puts computing to shame.

And we're looking forward to meeting all of you.