IMS Research forecasts that the worldwide market for PLCs will grow at around 5.0 per cent per year to surpass $9billion by 2011. The Asia Pacific region is forecast to experience the strongest growth, with an estimated compound annual growth rate of 7.9 per cent.
Although Europe, the Middle East and Africa represented the largest market for PLCs in 2006, more attention has been drawn to the Asia Pacific region due to the rapid growth it has experienced in recent years. This market is still developing and shows quite different trends compared to other major worldwide regions. At the moment, lower-cost, lower-functionality products are more readily being shipped in this region - a result of the less developed technology and fierce price competition. But the fast growing pace of this market shows more opportunities and the greatest potential for PLC products, along with the rise of more and more local PLC suppliers.
Unlike other worldwide regions, where suppliers focus more on improving price-performance ratio and developing new application areas for PLC products, price is the key issue in the battle between local suppliers and the larger global suppliers in the Asia Pacific region. Local suppliers typically have the desire and ability to beat the larger global suppliers by offering PLC products at a much lower price, which larger companies are unable to beat. Conversely, the larger global suppliers, who are keen to sell PLCs as part of a more complete system to customers, are, in turn, trying to hold the price. Both types of suppliers are successful in the Asia Pacific region, although they are typically targeting different types of customers.
In the future, larger suppliers to the Asia Pacific market will be hoping that trends that have occurred within other worldwide regions, most importantly the move for customers to purchase automation products as part of a more complete system, will bolster their PLC business within the Asia Pacific region. This, in turn, will limit the potential for local suppliers who are trying to sell PLCs as component products.
