Smart inhaler to become $3.56bn opportunity by 2024
The market for digital dose inhalers for asthma and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) will be worth $3.56bn by 2024 due to ageing populations and higher levels of industrialisation globally, according to Grand View Research. The Asia Pacific region is expected to see annual growth of 17% from now until 2024. Companies including Teva Phameceuticals and Adherium are expected to capitalise on this expected growth.

The market for digital dose inhalers for asthma and COPD will be worth $3.56 billion in 2024, according to a new prediction from Grand View Research.

Though connected inhalers are a new market, they've seen rapid growth in the last few years with interest from big pharma companies like AstraZeneca and Novartis, major device companies like Philips Respironics, as well as the newer, smaller players like Propeller Health that have made a big bet on the space.

Grand View sees that growth continuing into the next several years, citing an aging population and a surge in the prevalence of chronic respiratory disease as two drivers. They also foresee rapid growth for markets outside North America. The firm predicts the Asia Pacific region will grow at a 17 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) between now and 2024.

"As a result of impactful economic developments in the fast emerging countries, such as China, India, Brazil, Philippines, and others, there has been growth in the per capita income, which is thus expected to influence the demand for the technologically advanced respiratory devices," the firm writes in a press release. "Moreover, these technology-enabled respiratory devices are greatly sought after among the pediatric and the geriatric population so as to improve the patient medication compliance, dose tracking, and to enhance patient-healthcare practitioner connectivity that would enable real-time tracking of healthcare data; these serve as high impact rendering factors, significantly driving the market growth in the next nine years."

According to Grand View, the US market for metered dose inhalers, the largest segment of the digital inhaler market, was $563.9 million in 2015. But they predict the digital segment of dry powder inhalers will catch up, growing at a CAGR of 16.9 percent between now and 2024. Additionally, this year branded devices attached to medications accounted for $747.6 million.

The report names some major players in the space which include a number of companies MobiHealthNews has written about over the years, including Teva Pharmaceuticals, which bought into the space with its acquisition of Gecko Health; Opko Health, which acquired Inspiro Medical; AstraZeneca, a major investor in Australian smart inhaler company Adherium; and Propeller Health, which makes inhaler sensors for a growing number of pharma and provider partners including GSK and Boehringer Ingelheim. They also name Philips Respironics, Novartis, and Glenmark Pharmaceuticals. Glenmark launched a digital dose inhaler, which tracks usages digitally and alerts the user when it's close to empty, in May. Novartis announced in January that it would work with Qualcomm Life on a connected inhaler for COPD.

MobiHealthNews also put together a round-up of five companies in the connected inhaler space last year.