Ultrasound sales to post healthy growth

Innovations in radiology and cardiology will boost the U.S. ultrasound market over the next three years, according to a study conducted by Datamonitor, a market analysis firm specializing in the medical equipment and healthcare industries. Ultrasound should see a compound annual growth rate of approximately 7% over the next five years and will climb from its current $943 million market to $1.2 billion by 2003, Datamonitor’s “Trends and Dynamics in U.S. Ultrasound 1999” report claims. Ultrasound’s radiology segment represents about 40% of the overall ultrasound market, while cardiology represents about 35%, according to the report.

Acuson, Philips/ATL Ultrasound, and Hewlett-Packard are the top three companies in ultrasound, with GE Medical Systems and Toshiba America Medical Systems ranked next, according to the New York-based firm.

Although ultrasound sales have traditionally been driven by mid-range systems, this segment is now the smallest in both revenue and volume, since its technology has begun trickling down to low-end systems. Datamonitor predicts that although all segments of the ultrasound market will see growth, sales of high-end radiology and cardiology units will particularly increase, as their technology becomes more capable of competing with such other imaging modalities as MRI and CT.