Leading health care group purchasing organization (GPO), Amerinet, recently announced the close of its acquisition of the group purchasing assets of Vector, Inc. Prior to the acquisition, Providence, R.I.-based Vector was a shareholder company of Amerinet.

Amerinet had previously announced plans to better serve health care providers through a new model designed to transform the GPO from its original shareholder-based model to a single national enterprise. One of the key initiatives in implementing the new model was to acquire the group purchasing assets of Vector.

Amerinet also announced a new board of directors chaired by Bert R. Zimmerli, senior vice president and chief financial officer of Intermountain Healthcare. Victor E. Samolovitch is the new chief executive officer of Amerinet, and Todd Ebert has been selected as its new president and chief operating officer.

“The Amerinet board of directors explored several possibilities when designing the new business model and the option of purchasing Vector, which was operating as an employee-owned company, best fit our strategic plan,” said Samolovitch. “The goal for the new business model is to simplify Amerinet’s structure and operations and reduce costs to create a more efficient organization to serve our more than 35,000 members nationally.”

The acquisition represents the most recent step in a process that began in 2003 when Amerinet united its network of companies under a new national image and strategic direction.