The global in vitro diagnostics (IVD) market is expected to grow to $69.1 billion by 2017, up from $49.2 billion in 2012, according to a new report by Research and Markets.

The growth represents a 7% compounded annual growth rate in five years.

Self-testing is the biggest trend fueling the growth of the industry whereas before patients used to visit hospitals for certain kinds of diagnosis. As a result, the number of point-of-care testing products has grown.

Other factors that are contributing to the growth of the IVD industry globally are “ongoing developments in analytical laboratory automation, swift progress in various fields of diagnosis such as … molecular diagnosis, immunoassays, hematology, flow cytometry, microbiology and finally, the geographical market expansion within emerging countries.”

While the U.S., followed by Europe will continue to account for the largest markets for the industry, emerging regions like the BRIC countries represent areas of the fastest growth.

The industry can be categorized into the following segments based on technology:

The IVD industry can also be broken down into the following sub categories based on applications:

Some of the leading companies in the space are Abbott Laboratories, Roche Diagnostics, Becton Dickinson & Co., Siemens Healthcare of Germany and Diagnostica Stago SAS of France.

-- By Arundhati Parmar, Senior Editor, MD+DI
[email protected]