Which antibody supplier maintains the biggest market share?

In an update to one of our most popular datasets of 2014, today we’re releasing new figures that demonstrate the size of market share held by leading research antibody suppliers.

We all know that Santa Cruz Biotechnology has historically been the leading company in the antibody supplier market. Our data shows that while the company maintains its top position, it is quickly being caught up by others and has a lot to do if it’s to keep the largest share of the market in future years.

Since 2011, Cell Signaling Technology has seen a steady rise and with a market share of 17.96%, now very close to Santa Cruz Biotechnology’s 18.96%.

Dr Andrew Chalmers, founder of CiteAb, said: “Santa Cruz need to watch out – both Cell Signaling and Abcam are showing a more positive trajectory and if this continues we are likely to see a change in leadership for largest market share. When we look at this data again in a year’s time, I’d expect to see both Cell Signaling and Abcam ahead of Santa Cruz unless the company takes some serious steps to address the trend.”

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Many of the antibody suppliers we see in the top ten this year have either stayed at the same level of market share, or have lost some since our last report. However, when we look a little lower in the rankings, there is some rapid growth taking place among small and medium sized companies.

Dr Chalmers said: “We’re seeing the likes of Novus make a bid for a place in the top ten suppliers – based on 2014 data they are in 11th place, and I’d expect to see them in the top ten next year if they maintain their current level of growth.

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“It is interesting to see that many of the faster-growing smaller companies have a range of business approaches. Some have a large catalogue, some very small. Others are fairly focused, such as BioLegend who have seen a high level of growth over the last five years, some are far more general. Each company has its own story but perhaps there is also a greater willingness among researchers to shop around and no longer go directly to the big names.”

A couple of the companies we highlighted in our report last year, and predicted further growth for, have seen significant increases in market share – namely Proteintech, GeneTex and Atlas Antibodies. In addition, some new companies including Bioss Antibodies and Bioworld, have broken into the market over the last year.

Meet IgGy - the friendly Bioss dragon mascot!
Meet IgGy – the friendly Bioss dragon mascot!

Bioss Antibodies has shown impressive growth since starting to distribute to the international market in 2011. Victoria Chen, product manager at Bioss, told us: “There could be a number of factors contributing to Bioss Antibodies’ increased market share, including the introduction of positive changes based on valuable customer and market feedback.

“With growing awareness and importance of antibody validations in the scientific community, we have been putting a tremendous amount effort in to obtaining solid antibody validations both internally and through direct end-user feedback.”

Bioss carries a wide range of products, with around 11,000 unconjugated primary antibodies and 13 different conjugations, so gives scientists many choices to accelerate their research findings.

Victoria adds: “Being an antibody manufacturer, we are able to keep the price very competitive and offer the most prompt and direct scientific support to our customers. We are very confident in our products and we offer programs that allow scientists to try our antibodies at low or no risk.”

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Dr Chalmers added: “What makes this update to our company market share data set especially exciting is the large number of smaller and often fairly new companies which look like they are growing. We will, I am sure, see a very different picture when we look at data for market share in a couple of years time – many of these smaller companies might have made their way into prime positions, and existing large players will need to innovate and adapt to market demands if they’re to maintain market share.”

We’d love to hear your thoughts on these latest changes in the antibody market – have you purchased antibodies from any of these companies recently? Do share any insights you have on their customer service, antibody quality or other factors that might be playing a part in their growth either by commenting below, tweeting us @CiteAb, or on LinkedIn, and Facebook.

We are making data on the top five in today’s market report available for free – to get your copy, please complete the signup form below. You will also receive a free graph for your company, but please use your company email address when signing up so we can verify your affiliation.

To explore access to the full market report please contact us and we’ll discuss options and pricing with you. This report, like all our reports, is based on the analysis of hundreds of thousands of antibody citations.

– David and the CiteAb team

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