VA picks Abridge for $775.7M ambient AI scribe contract across its medical centers
The Department of Veterans Affairs selected Abridge under a five-year, multi-award enterprise contract with a ceiling of $775.72 million to provide ambient AI scribes. Knowtex also holds a seat on the contract. The VA began piloting ambient scribes from both vendors in October 2025. The tool is now available to primary care, behavioral health, physical medicine and rehabilitation, and medical and surgical specialty clinicians at more than 75 VA medical centers. Abridge says its scribe runs on both the VA's legacy VistA/CPRS system and the new Oracle Health federal EHR.
Why it's notable: This is one of the largest single ambient AI deployments in US healthcare, and it spans two different EHR platforms. How it goes at the VA will be a reference point for other large systems deciding whether to scale AI scribes.