Optical measurements tap huge potential

Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team May 15, 2006

The increasing need for precise and accurate component measurements is by far the predominant factor driving the demand for optical digitisers and scanners across the world.

The increasing need for precise and accurate component measurements is by far the predominant factor driving the demand for optical digitisers and scanners across the world.

Given their fund sufficiency to test new technologies, the aerospace and automotive end-user sectors have played a key role in pioneering the technology, subsequently driving market growth.

On the other hand, the approaching maturity in certain end-user sectors is negatively impacting demand in these areas, forcing market participants to vigorously explore new avenues such as large manufacturing industries in order to expand their market base.

Frost and Sullivan finds that the world optical digitisers and scanners market earned revenues of $244.5 million in 2005 and will reach $615.2 million in 2012.

Significantly, the increasing demand for optical digitisers and scanners throughout Asia Pacific is emerging a crucial driver for the global optical digitisers and scanners market.

Benefiting from buoyant economies, most countries in this region are witnessing growth in terms of construction and infrastructure, resulting in an increased uptake of optical digitisers and scanners.

"Laser trackers find major applications in the aerospace, military, and defence as well as automobile industries and due to an increasing focus on these industries in Asia Pacific, the regional demand for laser trackers looks promising", explains Frost and Sullivan Research Analyst Prathima Bommakanti.

"As the region continues to gain momentum in terms of increased market share, most participants are setting up branch offices in the growth regions of Asia Pacific to ensure their global presence as well as maximise sales volumes".

However, despite the tremendous market potential for optical digitisers and scanners, the relative novelty of the technology is creating considerable challenges for industry participants.

In traditional manufacturing environments, conservative end users are slow in adopting the technology and in several instances, they consider co-ordinate measurement machine (CMM) touch probes the referred and accepted method.

Also, in serving niche markets in the manufacturing sector, the technology as well as the software needs to be customised to suit the applications and participants often find the integration of scanning solutions time consuming.

These apart, some market participants opine that the utilisation rates for particular types of manual optical digitisers and scanner remain low.

Indicating that the usage rates are likely to be 30 to 40% in certain instances, they further say that the movement of these measuring systems to the shop floor has added to the problem.

In addition, certain end users are unable to afford dedicated employees to handle these machines, thus impacting their utilisation rates.

"In overcoming these challenges, market participants should have a global focus and work towards forging strategic alliances, achieving a strong customer base and exploring niche market opportunities", says Bommakanti.

"In doing so, participants can successfully raise their competitive edge in the growing global optical digitisers and scanners market".