Alkoxylates Market Expected to Reach $11.0 Billion by 2031—Allied Market Research

According to a new report published by Allied Market Research, titled, “Alkoxylates Market," The alkoxylates market was valued at $6.9 billion in 2021, and is estimated to reach $11.0 billion by 2031, growing at a CAGR of 4.9% from 2022 to 2031.

Alkoxylates are chemicals produced by the process of alkoxylation, wherein compounds, such as alcohols, phenols, and amines react with alkoxides to form alkoxylate. It has various types depending upon the chemical reactions. It possesses attributes such as corrosion inhibition, cleansing agent, stabilizer, wetting agent, owing to which it has a wide range of application in various end-use industries.

Fatty acid natural ethoxylates are used as emulsifying agents, owing to its eco-toxicological property. In addition, they are used in production of emulsion polyvinyl chloride. Emulsified polyvinyl chloride further serves the function of viscosity depressants. Fatty amine natural alkoxylates are mainly derived from vegetable and animal origins. Block and random ethylene oxide/propylene oxide derivatives are two types of fatty amine natural alkoxylates available in the market.

Natural derived fatty amine alkoxylates are used as wetting and levelling agents in during textile processing. In addition, it can also be used as adjuvants during agrochemical formulations and corrosion inhibitor in oil & gas industry. Natural alkoxylates based on castor oil and hydrogenated castor oil are mainly derived from triglycerides with a hydroxyl group on the fatty acid chain. Hydrophilic-lipophilic property of natural alkoxylates based on castor oil derivatives are used in water in oil or oil in water emulsifiers. All these factors have escalated demand for ethixylates and thereby augmenting the growth of the global market.

Rise in environmental concern regarding maximum toxicity of some of the fatty alcohol-based ethoxylates has made manufacturers increase their production capacities of biodegradable alkoxylates. For instance, Nonylphenol based ethoxylates are toxic in nature, owing to which it has been banned in many developed countries. Furthermore, stringent government norms and regulations on the use of alkoxylates have disturbed the overall growth of the alkoxylates market. These factors together are predicted to detriment the overall growth of the alkoxylates market.

Fatty alcohol alkoxylates exhibit a wide range of applications and are mainly used as wetting agents due to their hydrophilic-lipophilic balance. This is augmented to enhance demand for alkoxylates during the forecast period. Furthermore, rise in population across the globe, increase in demand for various clothes, and adoption of growing fashion trends have spurred the textile industry where tristyrylphenol alkoxylates are used as a wetting agent for pigment dispersion in textiles. This is projected to enhance demand for an alkoxylates-based wetting agents in the textile industry.

Moreover, utilization of alkoxylates has increased in various industries such as oil & gas, agrochemicals, paints, and varnishes, owing to which key manufacturers increased their production capacities for alkoxylates and fatty alcohol ethoxylates. For instance, Lamberti S.p.A. offers a diversified range of alkoxylates such as fatty acid alkoxylates, castor oil ethoxylates, formaldehyde alkoxylates, fatty amines alkoxylates, and others. Fatty amine alkoxylates and nonyl phenol & alkyl ether plus fatty acid has the main application as a wetting agent in the formulation of various agrochemicals such as pesticides, herbicides, and insecticides. All these factors collcetivily anticipated to offer new growth opportunities. 

The alkoxylates market is segmented on the basis of grade, type, application, end user industry, and region. By grade the market is divided into natural ethoxylates and synthetic ethoxylates. The synthetic ethoxylates segment dominated the global market, in terms of revenue in 2021 with 51% share in the global market. Synthetic ethoxylates are mainly based on ethylene oxide, propylene oxide, glycerin, and sorbitan ester. Sorbitan ester based synthetic ethoxylates are used as emulsifiers and combination of non ethoxylates counterpart improves emulsification property. Thus, sorbitan ester based ethoxylates are widely used emulsifying agents , which is the key market trend. In addition, it can also be used in consumer products and other industrial applications such as textiles, personal care formulation, and others. Glycerin based synthetic ethoxylates are mainly used as antifoam agents in paper, textile, ad ceramic industry.

By type, the market is divided into fatty acid ethoxylates, alkyl phenol ethoxylates, glycerin alkoxylates, sorbitan ester alkoxylates, and others. The fatty acid ethoxylates segment dominated the global market, in terms of revenue in 2021 with 41% share in the global market. Fatty acid ethoxylates are produced by the process of ethoxylation on fatty acid such as coconut fatty acid, lauric acid, steric acid, and oleic acid.

These are the non-ionic surfactant manufactured by addition of ethylene oxide to fatty acid. It is clear liquid, pasty and waxy solid compound. Furthermore, fatty acid ethoxylate are nonionic surfactants and exhibit excellent foam properties, solvency, and has greater chemical stability providing good detergency properties due to which it is extensively used in various end use industry.The applications covered in the report includes wetting agent, cleaning gent, detergent, stabilizer, surfactants, and others. The surfactants segment dominated the global market, in terms of revenue in 2021, with 27% share in the global market. Surfactants are surface active agents and have a wide range of applications in various end use industries.

In addition, they help in reducing the surface tension of water and surface. Surfactants are basic cleansing agents in laundry, home care, and personal care products. Furthermore, fatty alcohol ethoxylate is non-ionic surfactant mainly used in washing detergents, both domestic and industrial. Various alkoxylate-based surfactants find application in industrial sectors. In addition, factors such as growing industrial sectors in both developed and developing economies such as the U.S., China, and India, lead to growth of fatty alcohol ethoxylates where it is extensively used in ethoxylation process of industrial surfactants.

The personal care segment comprises diversified skin care products where alkoxylate plays a significant role in increasing potential sales of the personal care & beauty care industry. Alkoxylate is identified as a good source of preservative and biocide, owing to which it is used in the formulation of cosmetics products, lotions, creams, and others. Rise in population, urbanization, improvement in the standard of living, changing lifestyles, and increased focus on the personal care & beauty care industry have led to rise in demand for natural and synthetic ethoxylates, where synthetic fatty alcohol ethoxylates are used as moderate foaming agents in personal care products for the formulation of various skin care products such as body soaps, lotions, face creams, and perfumes.

By end-user, the market divided into agrochemicals, paints& coatings, personal care, pharmaceutical, oil & gas, others.  The personal care segment dominated the global market, in terms of revenue in 2021, with 23% share in the global market. Region wise, the alkoxylates market is analyzed across North America, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and LAMEA. The Asia-Pacific alkoxylates market size is projected to grow at the highest CAGR during the forecast period and accounted for a major market share in 2021.

Increase in need for a wide range of consumer products has led to growth of industrial sectors where alkoxylates are used for corrosion protection applications in the oil & gas industry. This is anticipated to increase the sales of alkoxylates in industrial sectors.

India has witnessed a significant growth for alkoxylates in the agrochemical sector. For instance, according to an article published by the India Brand Equity Foundation in January 2021, the agrochemicals market in India is expected to register a CAGR of 8% to reach US$ 3.7 billion by FY22 and US$ 4.7 billion by FY25. These factors are responsible for growth the alkoxylates market in the growing agrochemical sector.

Key players operating in the global alkoxylates market include Clariant AG, Croda International Plc, DOW, IMCD Group, Indorama Ventures Public Company Limited, Lamberti S.p.A., PCC Group, Schärer & Schläpfer AG, Solvay, and Stepan Company.

Key findings of the study:

• The natural ethoxylates segment is estimated to display the highest growth rate, in terms of revenue, registering a CAGR of 4.9% from 2022 to 2031.
• The fatty acid ethoxylates segment is estimated to display the highest growth rate, in terms of revenue, registering a CAGR of 5.3% from 2022 to 2031.
• Surfactants segment garnered the highest share of 27% in 2021, in terms of revenue, growing at a CAGR of 5.4%.
• The agrochemicals segment is estimated to display the highest growth rate, in terms of revenue, registering a CAGR of 5.2% from 2022 to 2031.
• The Asia-Pacific region is estimated to display the highest growth rate, in terms of revenue, registering a CAGR of 5.3% from 2022 to 2031.

COVID-19 Analysis:

The alkoxylates market has moderate impact due to the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Owing to rise in cases of COVID-19, implementation of emergency protocols and shutdown of various operations and facilities have been observed during 2020. Due to the spread of the coronavirus pandemic, manufacturers have faced challenges in terms of operation and supply chain, lack of feed stock, and due to government restrictions during the lockdown.  However, the alkoxylates market faced several difficulties with material supply chain disruptions, import & export trade, and labor shortages, in 2020.

Furthermore, to control the surge of novel coronavirus cases, there is a drastic shift of investments from other sectors toward agrochemical, paint and coatings, pharmaceutical, household consumer products sector. In addition, several alkoxylates product manufacturing companies have either shut down or reduced their operations due to the risk of infection among the workforce. Moreover, countries in North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific region are leading supplier of alkoxylates and their derivatives across the globe, amid COVID-19 pandemic the production rate of alkoxylates has decreased slightly due to the strict government guidelines on boarder, norms and regulation on import and export trade.

In addition, there is decrease in the number of covid-19 cases in the fourth quarter of 2020 due to which there is surge in the demand for personal care, consumer products, and hygiene related products. In addition, as the restrictions imposed due to lockdowns are being lifted in the fourth quarter of the pandemic, the pharmaceutical, personal care, and cosmetics, agrochemicals, paint and coatings, oil & gas manufacturing sector is expected to recover soon, owing to record of production unit in both developed and developing economies. In the first quarter of 2021, the market for alkoxylates has experienced an increase in demand for alkoxylate chemicals worldwide compared to that in 2020.