Some bizarre statistics about nanotechnology market growth are being bandied around followimg the “Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) along with Department of Science & Technology, (DST), Government of India, Gwangju Institute of Science & Technology (GIST) and Tamil Nadu Technology Development Promotion Council” fourth Nanotechnology Conclave 2009.

This looks like a perfect storm of the longest and most complex conference name (you certainly couldn’t tweet that!) and the least informative piece of information so far in 2009.

The fastest growing segments of the market are scanning probe microscopes, with a CAGR of 19.4% between 2007 and 2012, and charged particle microscopes with a CAGR from 2007 to 2012 of 9.0%. Optical microscopes are projected to have the lowest growth rate of any major market segment (5.6% CAGR). As a result, charged particle microscopes, which have the largest market share of any product segment, are projected to increase their market share further, from 52% in 2006 to 52.1% in 2012. Optical microscopes are projected to lose market share, from 26.2% in 2006 to 21.9% in 2012. In 2006, semiconductor manufacturing was the dominant end-user market for microscopes, with 31% of the total market, followed by life sciences (27%) and materials (24%), and nanotechnology (10%). Nanotechnology and semiconductor manufacturing are the fastest-growing end-user markets with CAGRs of 19.4% and 10.2% respectively.