Overall growth in demand for MS is expected to be in the mid-single digits in 2013, which is somewhat stronger than 2012, but still well under the more typical pace in recent history of around 10%. Aside from portable and in-field MS, all categories of instrumentation are expected to experience much better growth in 2013. Trends in the market include increasing competition between the major vendors as they expand into more segments of the market, and moves by many of the leading vendors to position themselves to address the growing clinical analysis sector.

Quadrupole LC/MS, which includes both single quadrupole and triple quadrupole MS technologies, is the largest of the MS categories and will soon eclipse $1 billion in annual demand. The strong pace of technological improvements in triple quadrupole sensitivity and performance continues to drive demand for high-end systems, while innovations trickle down rapidly to routine triple quadrupole and single quadrupole models. The entry of Shimadzu into the triple quadrupole segment in 2011, followed by Bruker in 2012, has made the triple quadrupole LC/MS area extremely competitive, with all six of the major MS system suppliers now involved.

Single quadrupole instruments dominate the installed base for GC/MS systems and provide a strong driver for replacement sales. However, most of the near-term growth in the GC/MS market is expected to result from demand for triple quadrupole GC/MS, which is rapidly becoming a more routine analytical tool. The re-launch of the former Varian business by Bruker and the entrance of Shimadzu into the triple quadrupole segment now doubles the number of major system suppliers.

Another stimulus for growth of the GC/MS market has been the development of a commercial Q-TOF GC/MS by Agilent, which is helping to drive the smaller GC-TOF portion of the market. Improvements in other GC/MS technologies are beginning to minimize many of the advantages of ion trap technology, which is expected to experience flat to slightly declining demand for the foreseeable future.

FT/MS, which are nearly all configured as LC/MS systems, and ion trap LC/MS have been grouped together because they both are based on various types of ion trap designs. Although ion trap LC/MS sales are still the larger percentage of this market segment, the return to double-digit growth for FT/MS is what will drive demand in 2013. With the discontinuation of Agilent’s high-end FT/MS business, and a minimal presence by Thermo, Bruker is the only major supplier of such systems. Thermo is also the only significant supplier of Orbitrap-based FT/MS instruments, which are proving to be quite popular, despite competing heavily against Q-TOF LC/MS systems. Demand for ion trap LC/MS is expected to experience fairly slow growth, as end-users continue to shift from conventional designs in favor of linear and other, more novel ion trap LC/MS designs.

The majority of demand for TOF LC/MS comes from Q-TOF systems, which are expected to see the strongest sales growth among all MS technologies in 2013. Most, if not all, of the major Q-TOF vendors have continued to make significant performance improvements annually, which has helped drive double-digit growth in most years. In contrast, there has been less focus on LC-TOF development, as the configuration does not allow for the use of most ion fragmentation techniques. Therefore, growth in demand should continue to be much more modest.

Demand for MALDI-TOF should grow in the mid-single digits in 2013 and likely will be stronger beyond, as vendors, end-users and regulators develop effective pathways to implement MS in clinical analyses. Magnetic sector demand is largely relegated to niche applications and will continue to gradually wane. Demand for portable and in-field MS is dominated by government sales, which are likely to take a significant hit in demand in 2013 before bouncing back.

 Pie Chart: 2012 MS Suppliers’ Market Shares

 AB SCIEX  21%

 Agilent   20%

 Thermo    18%

 Waters    13%

 Bruker     8%

 Shimadzu   7%

 Other     13%

 Mass Spectrometry Market Leaders

 Quadrupole LC/MS         AB SCIEX (Danaher), Agilent

 GC/MS                    Agilent, Shimadzu

 FT/MS, Ion Trap LC/MS    Thermo Fisher Scientific, Bruker

 TOF LC/MS                Waters, AB SCIEX (Danaher)

 MALDI-TOF                Bruker, Shimadzu

 Magnetic Sector          Thermo Fisher Scientific, JEOL

 Portable, In-Field       Inficon, FLIR

 Mass Spectrometry 2012–2013

                     2012 Market Share        2013 Growth Rate

 Quadrupole LC/MS         31.7%                    5.3%

 GC/MS                    19.3%                    3.6%

 FT/MS, Ion Trap LC/MS    17.1%                    6.6%

 Time-of-Flight LC/MS     16.5%                    6.8%

 MALDI-TOF                10.6%                    4.9%

 Magnetic Sector           3.1%                   -1.7%

 Portable & In-Field       1.8%                   -2.0%

 Total                   100.1%                    5.1%

 Bar Graph: 2011–2014 Total Mass Spectrometry Market

                  2011    2012    2013    2014

 $ Millions      2,842   2,946   3,095   3,397

 Pie Chart: 2012 MS Market by Product Type

 Initial Systems    69%

 Service            20%

 Aftermarket        11%