Smart hospital projects, meaning the utilization of tablet PCs for medical purposes, are following one after another. Healthcare companies, on their part, are coming up with pertinent tablet-PC applications. For example, Choongwaae Information Technology, Infinitt Healthcare and InnoPNT are commercializing the EMR (electronic medical record) and PACS (picture archiving and communications system) applications of their own development. They say, when it comes to medical-purpose portable devices, tablet PCs are a better choice than smart phones as the latter’s screens are too small for those solutions. In the meantime, mobile carriers and device manufacturers are seeking business ties with such software developers. The idea is that their tablet PCs, if carried by doctors and nurses, could appeal to patients and hospital visitors, or prospective buyers, to some extent. Some in the industry are saying hospitals will be the first test bed to find out who wins over more tablet-PC customers -- Samsung’s 7-inch Galaxy Tab or Apple’s 9.7-inch i-Pad. The two are pitching portability and legibility, respectively, heating up the rivalry. Samsung Electronics, in a bid to dominate the market in advance, supplied its Galaxy Tab-based “Dr. Smart” solution to the Samsung Medical Center (SMC) on November 8, even before the product was launched. The SMC is the medical corporation run by the conglomerate’s public welfare foundation. “It’s just neck-and-neck. Some of the hospitals prefer the more readable i-Pad and the others opt for the Galaxy Tab mentioning the need to carry it around-the-clock,” said a healthcare firm, adding “We think such competition will attract more handheld makers and grow the size of the tablet-PC solution market significantly.”