New Solution Will Help Meeting Managers Track and Accurately Report HCP-Related Spending

May 24, 2011 – NEW YORK and MCLEAN, VA – Cvent, the world's largest provider of online event management, meeting site selection and web survey solutions, today announced plans to roll out a new Strategic Meetings Management (SMM) solution in the third quarter of 2011 that will help meeting managers at pharmaceutical and other life sciences companies comply with fast-approaching federal reporting requirements for expenses involving health care professionals (HCPs).

"Under the Physician Payments Sunshine Provisions, included in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2009, pharmaceutical, biotechnology, and medical supply manufacturing companies must publicly report all gifts and payments made to physicians and teaching hospitals annually or risk hefty fines. Companies must begin recording this information by January 1, 2012, with the first report due by March 31, 2013. For many companies, meetings and events account for a significant portion of HCP spend, and making sure this spend is accurately and consistently captured is a daunting task.

With unparalleled customization and reporting options, and backed by an experienced team of implementation consultants, Cvent's HCP solution ensures meeting managers can generate both detailed and summary reports of meetings-related HCP expenses, such as food, travel, lodging, honoraria, entertainment, and speaking fees.

"All too often, other software companies rush to market with half-baked or simply repackaged solutions that fall short. At Cvent, we take a very different approach by investing the time to truly listen to our clients' needs, allowing us to consistently deliver best-in-class solutions," said Chuck Ghoorah, Cvent's Co-Founder and Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing. "Cvent's HCP solution is the most accurate and customizable offering available and provides thorough reporting without sacrificing ease-of-use."

Specific features of Cvent's HCP solution include:

• Approval routing and review for meeting requests;
• Flexible field customization and unlimited budget allocation options so HCP attendees can be identified and expenses can be appropriated and tracked;
• Automatic spend calculations per participant that deliver accurate expense details;
• Application Programming Interface (API) access so clients can easily incorporate meetings data into other reporting systems; and
• Spend-per-participant reporting as well as one-click reporting that summarizes spend data by product, allocations and vendor.

"With more than 400 customers in the healthcare, pharmaceutical and medical device industries, Cvent has its finger on the pulse of the healthcare industry. That said, Cvent's solution not only addresses HCP requirements but also the compliance needs of other industries, and we will continue to add enhanced functionality, such as features that alert meeting managers to potential fines, to help our clients implement effective meetings compliance programs," said Anil Punyapu, Vice President of Enterprise Sales and Partnerships at Cvent.