Gas and particle sensors come to the consumer market

Author: EIS Release Date: Jul 20, 2021


Gas and particle sensors will be a $2.2 billion market in 2026, says Yole Developpement, with the gas sensor market forecast to reach $1.8 billion revenues in 2026 at a 2020-26 CAGR of 10%, and the particle sensor market expected to have a 2020-26 CAGR of 16.3% and expected to reach $407 million in 2026.
 
The consumer market is driving the growth of gas sensors with a 39.4% CAGR20-26.
 
The HVAC market, including home air purifiers, will have an 18% CAGR20-26.
 
The air comfort for transportation market will have a 15.6% CAGR20-26.
Major improvements for gas sensors are miniaturization and low power consumption. The trend is going towards more combos (humidity, temperature, pressure with gas sensors) as well as electronic nose developing in parallel for digital olfaction.
 
The gas sensor market is dominated by 5 companies, with almost 70% of the total market, in revenue. They are Bosch, Delphi, NGK-NTK, Denso and Honeywell.
 
Beyond this top 5, this industry welcomes a myriad of companies.
 
The particle sensor industry has 3 main leading companies: Sharp is still leading in shipments and Plantower is leading in revenue at almost $20 million.
 
The established automotive powertrain, industrial and HVAC4 markets still dominate, generating around 80% of gas and particle sensor sales, but consumer applications seem ready to take off, thanks to the development of smart home and wearables.
 
Such  products make it possible to monitor both indoor and outdoor air quality, enabling consumers to act according to information measured. This is the market where the biggest momentum is expected, with nearly 40% growth over the period 2020-2026.
 
The development of automotive in-cabin solutions is also an expanding market, showing interest in terms of both comfort and safety. From selective to non-selective gas detection, consumer and automotive markets are also benefiting from advanced technologies in digital olfaction, mimicking human or animal smell sense using electronic noses to detect odors made of VOCs5.
 
Gases such as CO2, NOx or VOCs are the main targets for these technologies. The lack of selectivity of MOS technologies and the bulkiness of NDIR sensors has slowed down the adoption of MOS and NDIR based sensors for a long time, but advanced technologies and new applications fostered a higher adoption of these technologies.
 
Both technologies represent about a quarter of the market share in 2020 which is expectedto grow to 41% of global revenues in 2026, thanks to emerging applications and technological advances that are more selective and smaller.
 
MOS and NDIR are expected to decrease the historical market share of electrochemical detectors”. In the field of particle sensors, a transition has already started concerning optical detection through optical scattering.
 
In particular, this means the use of laser sources instead of LEDs, allowing better measurement of both higher concentration and smaller size particles.
 
Advanced technologies and emerging usage for gas and particle sensors are delivering momentum with possible M&A, new players in the field and a stronger interest for gas and particle applications.