2022 Performance of Instrument Giants in China

As the world's most active emerging market, the influence of China's market on the entire global scientific instrument market is rising year by year, and revenue in China has become the most important part of the global performance of many multinational companies. In the 2022 earnings season, many companies had lit up the previous year's performance.

Among the Top 20 global listed instrument companies in terms of revenue in 2022, a total of 12 companies announced their revenue in China in their earnings reports. All of them have achieved growth in China, except for Illumina. 3 of the 12 companies have achieved more than $1 billion USD in China: Danaher, Thermo Fisher Scientific and Agilent.

Danaher's China results jumped 47.88% in 2021 and became the TOP 1 on the China revenue list with $3.975 billion USD in revenue. 2022 showed a slower growth in China with a slight increase of 0.7%, still topping the list with $4.002 billion USD in China. In its annual report, Danaher also indicated that core sales in high-growth markets grew at a low-single-digit rate in 2022 compared to 2021, with broad-based growth in these markets led by growth in China.

Thermo Fisher's 2022 revenue in China is $3.793 billion USD, an increase of 10.1%. In recent years, Thermo Fisher has increased its investment in China, including the construction of a new biopharmaceutical production base in Hangzhou, and investment in Guangzhou to build a base in Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macao Bay Area, accelerating the localization layout in China.

Agilent's 2022 revenue in China was $1.499 billion USD, up 17.8%. China has been Agilent's largest overseas market, its revenue in China accounted for more than 20% of the company's total results. In the earnings report, Agilent reported that its liquid chromatography, diagnostics, and genomics businesses all achieved significant growth in China. 

In terms of growth rate, compared with the global market, the Chinese market is significantly more active, and the growth rate of each company's performance in China is generally higher than its overall growth rate. Among them, PerkinElmer achieved a 5.8% growth in China despite the decline in global performance. In China, there are two companies, Sartorius and Eppendorf. For Satorius, the growth rate has exceeded 20% for three consecutive years.

As can be seen, the vast majority of companies in the industry's Top 20 range saw their revenue share in China rise, reflecting the strong global position of the Chinese market. Among the 12 instrument companies with data published, the vast majority of companies in China accounted for more than 10% of the overall performance, with Agilent accounting for the highest percentage, reaching 21.9%. Thermo Fisher China, on the other hand, accounts for a relatively low share of performance, at 8.4% in 2022.

It is clear from the performance of multinational companies in China in 2022 that although affected by multiple factors such as the new crown epidemic, war and conflict, and supply chain imbalance, the Chinese scientific instrument market still performed outstandingly in the global market in 2022. halfway through 2023, the performance situation seems to be not optimistic from the published first quarter financial reports of many companies.