Fiber Optic Gyroscope Market - Growth, Trends, COVID-19 Impact, and Forecasts (2022 - 2027)

The Fiber Optic Gyroscope Market is expected to grow at a CAGR of 5.7% over the forecast period 2021 - 2026. Fiber optic gyroscope-based inertial navigation systems exhibit a high output rate and attain high accuracy at measuring the angular velocity of multiple objects in a vast range of angles. This entails the rapidly-growing adoption of inertial navigation systems in unmanned military vehicles and airborne surveillance systems, ultimately triggering demand for fiber optic gyroscopes in the aerospace & defense industry.

Key Highlights

• The rapidly rising adoption of drones and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in the defense and commercial sectors has been recognized as a primary driver in the market. The number of small hobbyist drones registered in the United States totaled 1.1 million units in 2019, according to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Commercial drone registrations totaled about 412,000 in 2019.
• Additionally, the significant factors that positively influence the fiber optics gyroscope (FOG) market are increased defense investments in numerous developing and developed economies and the rising adoption of automation in industries and homes. For instance, In 2019, the United States spent around 718.69 billion U.S. dollars on its military. This figure was an increase from 2000 when U.S. military spending amounted to USD 466.76 billion.
• Countries like Israel has been at the forefront of military application development. Israeli drone companies are also leading the way for autonomous solutions for enterprises with Tel Aviv-based Airobotics, hence boosting the fiber optic gyroscope market. Moreover, the fiber optic gyroscope employed for measuring purposes during the drilling processes in the oil sector and the growing recognition and development of remotely operated vehicles, also boosting the market.
• Although demand and necessity of fiber optics gyroscope in the market can be seen significantly, complicated, expensive, and time taking manufacturing process is a major restraining factor that generates restriction in practicing fiber optics gyroscope, and this hinders its market growth to a certain extent.

Key Market Trends

Aerospace and Defense Segment to Dominate the Market

• Widespread use of fiber optic gyroscopes in military applications, such as missiles flight control, ground detection, and dynamic Global Positioning System (GPS) tracking, has made the defense industry to remain one of the biggest end-user of fiber optic gyroscope. This, coupled with surging investments in the defense sector, like that in the U.S. and Europe, will continue to increase the demand for fiber optic gyroscope.
• UAVs are capable of performing a variety of missions supporting military and intelligence purposes and also a variety of civil purposes. This technology is used for sensing the motion of different aviation applications such as angular, velocity, and speed, among others. Such beneficial features and increasing uses create market demand, which is expected to boost the Fiber Optics Gyroscope market growth.
• There will be a massive requirement of small UAVs by the defense services in the coming years. For instance, currently, the IAF is planning to join hands with an Israeli firm to upgrade the UAVs of the three services under a project worth over Rs 5,000 crore to enhance their snooping capabilities; consequently, the IAF would be capable of operating these aircraft from far-off distances and control them through the satellite communication system.
• Owing to the increased investments in the aerospace and defense sector, the market presents lucrative opportunities for the market vendors, hence boosting the growth. For instance, according to Issuu, Inc., the global R&D spending in the aerospace and defense sector is anticipated to increase to USD 32 billion in 2019. Also, in 2018, the US Department of Defense invested USD 4.5 billion as against USD 3.8 billion in 2014 on unmanned aerial systems.

Asia-Pacific to Witness a Significant Growth Rate

• The Asia Pacific will experience a prominent market growth in the coming years due to some emerging economies that have increased its defense budget. China and Japan are two emerging countries with a huge demand for fiber optics gyroscope in the Asia Pacific region. Other factors that attribute this growth are large population base, increased number of R&D activities, rapid industrialization, and high investment for the improvement of the sensors.
• Moreover, as Japan is well known as the automobile industry's manufacturing hub, driverless vehicles' new development plan is giving rise to the adoption of fiber-optic-gyroscopes. Furthermore, the increased enforcement of regulations from countries like China, Japan, and South Korea, has encouraged companies to invest. Thus, end-user companies are willing to invest in the measurement of orientation in several devices monitoring systems for their safety, encouraging market growth.

Competitive Landscape

The Fiber Optic Gyroscope market is moderately competitive and consists of several major players. In terms of market share, few of these players currently dominate the market. The rapid rise of unmanned vehicles and technological advancements provides lucrative opportunities to the market vendors. Overall, the competitive rivalry among the existing competitors is moderate. Moving forward, the innovation strategy of companies is boosting the demand of the market. Moreover, higher complexity, time-consuming manufacturing, and high investment and low cost-benefit ratio restricted the entry of new players to manufacturer fiber optics gyroscope.

• July 2020 - KVH Industries, Inc., announced that it has received a new order with a net value of more than USD 10 million for its TACNAV tactical navigation systems for use by an international military customer. KVH’s fiber optic gyro (FOG)-based TACNAV systems are designed to provide unjammable inertial navigation data that fills in the gaps when GNSS is lost or unavailable, helping to keep soldiers and missions on track.

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