With the recent announcement of Hitachi to acquire the particle therapy business of Mitsubishi, we observe the first consolidation in the PT industry. Following this recent announcement, the top three vendors share now 70% of the PT market in 2017 valued at US$ 0.9 billion. Several companies are expected to enter the market for the first time in the coming years with their own PT systems. The global PT market will then count more than ten PT vendors. Do we have to consider this first acquisition as a premise to further consolidations? Time will tell, but the present market situation might motivate some vendors to merge their PT activities as well.

The global particle therapy equipment market (mainly proton therapy devices) showed an average annual growth rate of almost 14% from 2000 to 2017. For the first time, the proton therapy world market is anticipated to reach just over US$ 1 billion in 2018. This positive trend is a result of the large number of new orders recorded worldwide during 2015 and early 2016. However from mid-2016 on the number of new orders started to slow down, with a persistent decline during 2017. The number of new PT treatment rooms ordered in 2017 dropped by over 60% versus 2015. This decline will have a direct impact on the proton therapy market size evolution in 2019-2020, with a projected market slowdown of 5-10% annually in 2019 and 2020. This trend may change if particle therapy vendors are able to build a strong order book in 2018 and 2019.

The global PT market is estimated to reach between US$ 2.3 to 4.3 billion by 2030, with 900 to 1,300 particle therapy treatment rooms open to patients worldwide. This corresponds to a challenging trend that remains realistic, even taking into account the deceleration of PT orders that begun mid-2016 and continued declining persistently during 2017. This deceleration is mainly due to factors such as financial difficulties shown at several proton therapy centers in the recent past which has probably pushed certain potential investors to reconsider their priorities. In addition, apparent difficulties for a number of operational PT centers worldwide to recruit annually a sufficient number of patients are possibly also reconsidering the decision to build new PT centers. Furthermore, the US healthcare reforms are impacting new orders for large healthcare equipment, and the Chinese newly adopted five year plan resulted in delays for new orders from potentials customers. Cost hurdles have certainly been also an important factor in the slow adoption of proton therapy facilities in the recent past.

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