Analyzing the Current Situation of Fetal Bovine Serum

Abstract

Fetal bovine serum (FBS) is a market that has been discussed numerous times over the past decade. The topics of discussion have always revolved around the increase in price of FBS, regulatory issues, supply shortage, etc. But this article will cover the basics of the market along with the raw materials that are involved in FBS manufacturing and current price. This is expected to throw some light on how the industry is performing at present and what drives the prices.

High quality serum used in bio manufacturing and scientific research, have to meet certain regulations that are more aligned to the region from which the raw material is sourced. This indicates how sourcing the same FBS from different regions might play upon the price. The major raw material in the manufacturing FBS is fetal bovine blood. Collection of fetal bovine blood involves the fetus undergoing a painful process. Owing to this reason several associations have initiated the need to shift to serum free media in ell culture. But this has not stopped manufacturers from using FBS in cell culture. The market has been performing actively with fluctuations in price due to several factors. Let us discuss here how this market is performing at present.

Introduction to FBS

Volume of FBS produced globally in 2018 is estimated to be around 630,000 L. USA, Australia and New Zealand are the major regions from which FBS is sourced. Increasing demand for FBS coupled with slow growth in raw material fetal bovine blood (FBB) is one of the key challenges in the market. Although there is a shift toward artificial serum, there are certain applications for animal-based serum (especially, FBS), which cannot be overseen

• Quality of FBS is determined by the origin of the raw material
• FBS sourced from Australia and New Zealand is considered to be of superior quality, since these regions have very low or negligible risk of BSE and TSE
• USA is a major consumer of FBS for both research and manufacturing applications. Some of the major manufacturers of FBS like Thermo Fisher, Merck Millipore/ Sigma Aldrich and  GE Healthcare have their manufacturing facilities in USA
• Although many companies offer New Zealand origin FBS most of these FBS are not processed in New Zealand
• Demand for FBS has been driven by the rapid growth in biopharmaceutical industry. Cell culture media has been supplemented by FBS for many decades now
• Demand for FBS has been driven by the rapid growth in biopharmaceutical industry. Cell culture media has been supplemented by FBS for many decades now

Raw Material Trends

Price of FBS closely follows the trend of cow slaughter. Therefore when cow slaughter rates decrease FBS price is expected to increase 

In recent times there is much of fluctuation in cow slaughter and so the same is reflected in the FBS market

Close observation of cow slaughter rates could help us in predicting the movement of FBS market

Suppliers and Pricing of FBS

FBS market is dominated currently by three major players, Thermo Fisher, Millipore Sigma and GE Healthcare. These three players together hold almost 70% of the market. This state of market consolidation has occurred after the two major acquisitions of Life Technologies by Thermo Fisher and Sigma Aldrich by Merck Millipore.

• Price of FBS is different for each supplier and specifically Australian and New Zealand origin FBS are priced higher than FBS from other sources
• To benchmark the price of FBS in the market, we have analyzed the price of a particular FBS over a period of five years
• US origin heat inactivated FBS is considered and its price is tracked from 2015 to 2018
• Price of US origin Heat inactivated FBS imported into India was around USD 800/Liter in January 2019
• FBS market exhibits extremely high volatility and therefore the price of FBS cannot be forecasted like that of other commodities

Due to the certain scientific, ethical and supply challenges researchers have been forced to identify an alternative for FBS. Cost of raw material i.e., Fetal bovine blood (FBB) has increased significantly over the past few years. Supply of FBB is finite and it often affected by factors like weather pattern, dairy market, cattle cycles and beef demand

Conclusion

Fetal Bovine serum market is considered to be highly volatile due to the unstable nature of raw material availability. Supply chain risk in FBS manufacturing is majorly associated with the cow slaughter rates in various regions like Australia, New Zealand and USA. Alternatives for FBS are very limited in the market. New born calf serum, Bovine growth serum and fetal clone serum have been proposed as effective alternatives for FBS. However, the purity and efficiency achieved by FBS has not been observed in any other alternative so far. This indicates that the use of FBS in biopharmaceutical operations cannot be overseen.

Suppliers: When the market is highly consolidated there is limited option for cost savings while procuring FBS. Entry of new players is very rare at this stage. Apart from the major players there are smaller companies like Bovogen Biologicals, Moregate Biotech, Gemini Bio-products, Rocky Mountain Biologicals, etc. who have been in the market for long. But due to stiff competition among the big players, smaller players have limited opportunities to grow.

Price: Having experienced an upward trend for long, prices have starter stabilizing in recent times. However, prices still depend on fluctuating factors like climatic conditions, herd rebuilding and cattle slaughter rates

This concludes the summary of the fetal bovine serum market which is an evergreen market for discussion with its dynamic changes and updates.

References

• Industry Newsletters
• Export Import Data