Top Ten Suppliers of Food Safety Products and Technology

Report Highlights

Report Includes

• Identification of the top 10 companies in the market for food safety products and technology, and the rationale behind these selections.
• Factors taken into account, including technical innovation, market leadership, and commitment to this market via investment in products.

When selecting these top 10 companies, BCC Research looked across the industry spectrum and selected the most active and significant contributors while recognizing that there are many other contenders. Some of these “significant others” are included but to a less-detailed extent than the top 10 companies.

INTRODUCTION

The world’s population has crossed the 7 billion mark.  Providing food for such a large population is a significantly important business endeavor.  It is imperative that agriculture and animal rearing that contribute to the world’s food needs are also taken up in a large scale.  Apart from food production, the procurement, processing, packaging, logistics, distribution, delivery and final usage have all seen the impact of technology over the years.  One important aspect all along the chain from production to consumption is the need to guarantee the quality of food.

There is only one food item that is known to man that is not perishable, and it is honey.  This is because it is already digested by the bee.  Since humankind cannot survive on honey alone, the monitoring of all other food items, which are perishable with time, command high importance.  It is estimated that in developing countries, only 50% of food that is produced is finally consumed, the rest perishing at various stages of the distribution.  In developed countries, this is significantly less but still in double digits for various food items.

Automation of food production and distribution has also allowed industry growth in automated food testing for quality.  Such automated testing is typically first developed for use by large-scale food producers and distributors and later the methods are also adopted by smaller scale users.  Some of the tests are fairly common and straightforward, but even some technologically advanced test methods such as liquid chromatography and DNA testing are also used routinely to monitor food quality.

This report is an effort to bring clarity into this growing field by providing an in-depth analysis of the top 10 companies in the field of food quality testing.

STUDY GOAL AND OBJECTIVES

This document is a specialty report related to the BCC Research report “Global Markets and Technologies for Food Safety Testing,” report number FOD011G authored by Kevin Gainer in August 2012.  That report provided a global review of the food quality testing industry with trends, regulatory aspects and other macrolevel factors.  In that report, numerous companies are listed in brief, with each company’s region of operation and products listed.

The goal of this document is to provide a more in-depth look at the top 10 companies in the industry and to take a closer look at how the products from these companies are addressed in the market, thus providing an explorative financial and technical review to the readers.

The objectives include identifying companies that are considered the leaders and what technologies or management contributions make them leaders.  There are certain market drivers and some constraints to both the companies and to the evolving technology they seek to dominate.  There is a desire to ascertain whether these companies will be able to meet the continuing demand for their products by proprietary technology, strategy alliances, superior marketing or other sought-after advantages.

Most of the information presented in this report is based on that available from annual reports, various regulatory filings, the company website, U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and other public sources and the author hereby acknowledges the same.  Additional information was sourced from industry experts and people with close understanding of the industry dynamics.

INTENDED AUDIENCE

This report is intended especially for customer and supplier companies in the food industry and others with a need to understand the status and dynamics of the market for food testing methods and products.  This report is largely nontechnical in nature and coverage.  It is concerned less with theory and jargon than with what works, who the major global players are, what technological trends are seen in the market place and which regulations, trends, business relationships and intellectual properties are shaping the market.

As such, the report’s content should be highly useful to executive management personnel and marketing and financial analysts due to the organized presentation of data.  It is not written specifically for scientists and technologists, although its findings concern the market for their work, which should interest them and provide them with a clearer perspective as to how their work can influence the future of the industry.  Since this is a vast field, there is a multitude of established research organizations and universities, as well as industrial organizations and associations active in this area, and these details are briefly covered in this report.

The field of food safety testing is also extremely active in acquisitions.  Several companies detailed in the report have been actively pursuing acquisitions worldwide to meet their growth targets and ambitions.  The top 10 companies in this report all command revenues in the $50 million to $500 million range for business in the food safety testing market, and acquisitions have typically been less than $100 million in size.  Smaller companies and their management in various countries who are looking to be acquired would find this report useful in this regard.

Lastly, the report would also be a handy reference for personnel working in the regulatory field as well as in various health-related organizations.  How the private sector has developed over the years and what the food quality testing industry can offer as solutions to various food-related outbreaks can be extremely useful to them.

SCOPE

The scope of this report is a detailed analysis of the top 10 companies in the food testing technology sector.  This is in many ways a selected due diligence of the key companies and drivers in the food testing marketplace.  This is not a list of top 10 companies by revenues, profits or other financial criteria alone.  Instead, the focus has been to pick out companies that are most influential in the field, and this is based on a combination of several factors, including size, established technologies, historical aspects, business relationships, intellectual properties, impact of regulations and the global food marketplace as such.  In short, the companies selected in this report are those that can be considered as trendsetters in the field of food safety testing.  Hence, a detailed review of these companies also provides a deeper look into the sector dynamics.  A second list of companies that are important in the field apart from the top 10 is also provided.

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DISCLAIMER

The information developed in this report is intended to be as reliable as possible at the time of publication and of a professional nature.  This information does not constitute managerial, legal or accounting advice, nor should it serve as a corporate policy guide, laboratory manual or an endorsement of any product, as much of the information is of a speculative in nature.  The author assumes no responsibility for any loss or damage that might result from reliance on the reported information or from its use.

Analyst Credentials

Vijay Subramanian has a Ph.D. in Materials Science from the University of Cincinnati, and extensive experience in the field of materials and their global markets. He worked for more than a decade in the automotive industry in the U.S., and later in India, and owns several U.S. patents. Dr. Subramanian has authored reports for BCC Research since 2012. Dr. Subramanian lives with his wife and two daughters in Kochi, India.