This Frost & Sullivan research service titled World Machine Safety Market provides an overview of the revenue forecasts for the machine safety market across various geographies in the world along with a comprehensive analysis of the various drivers, challenges, and trends prevailing in the market. In this research, Frost & Sullivan's expert analysts thoroughly examine the following markets: electronic safety sensors, safety interlock switches, safety relays, safety programmable logic controller, and others (machine safeguarding panels, safety contactors, and so on).
Safety Regulations and Large-scale Adoption of Safe Working Practices Drive Market Growth
Machine safety market is one of the fastest growing segments in the entire industrial automation sector. The traditional discord between machine safety and machine uptime is progressively fading due to the large-scale implementation of safe-automation across a wide range of industries. Along with this, machine safety applications are becoming inherent, that are aimed to maximize profits and minimize the loss by enhancing machine up-time l without compromising overall safety requirements. Going forward, the market is expected to witness a double-digit growth rate, mainly due to the large-scale global adoption of safe working practices and the increasing need to comply with stringent safety regulations.
However, the machine safety market is highly fragmented with individual niche participants catering to single or multiple end users, holding nearly 26.0 percent of the market. Therefore, new technologies would be difficult to be adopted by the various market participants. "This fragmented nature of the market is contributing to intense price sensitivity, which might degrade the competitiveness of the market on a long run," notes the analyst of this research service. "With major automation vendors taking the business of safety seriously and the market transitioning from a component-based business to an integrated solution offering one, there would be a phase of consolidation in the next few years."
Technological Advancements Spur Market Acceptance
Technology advances and state-of-the-art solutions are increasing the acceptance and use of machine safety solution. Hard-wired relays, which require significant outflow in terms of time and money, are being replaced with intelligent controls such as safety programmable logic controller (PLC) and safe networks. Another upcoming trend is the use of safe networking, which has an integrated solution for both control and safety systems in a common base unit. A few known networks are Actuator-Sensor-Interface (ASI) and ProfiSafe, which reduce the cost involved in materials and installation. As technology develops further, there would be more intelligent products developed to ease maintenance capabilities. Another indirect impact would be on the enhanced diagnostic capabilities of the system, which in turn would reduce overall machine downtime significantly.
With regard to the end-user segments, the automotive industry is one of the main end users of the machine safety market, with a major share of revenues from the European region. The revenue contribution of this segment is likely to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12.9 percent from 2007 to 2014. "Regionally, Europe has always been the pioneer in the machine safety market with regard to both the compliance to regulations and the introduction of technologically advanced products," says the analyst. "It also holds the largest share of the total machine safety market, accounting for 47.0 percent in 2007."