Technology roadmap for hyaluronic acid and its derivatives market

Hyaluronic acid (HA) is an active ingredient that has attracted the attention of pharmaceutical companies. There are expectations that the market for it will grow in the next few years. A technology roadmap for hyaluronic acid and its derivatives market was built and analyzed. A roadmap is a prospective tool that allows the visualization of the evolution of a product or technology through time, revealing opportunities and providing greater safety for companies' and institutions' resource allocation. A search was conducted for patents that were granted or applied for in the USPTO database and for scientific articles in Science Direct database. The information was presented in categories in such a way that the evolution of the categories over time could be predicted. Analysis of the roadmap showed that the market is diverse with local and global companies developing patents in this sector. The main highlight is in the medical area, in which HA and its derivatives are widely used in the treatment of osteoarthritis, wound healing, cell regeneration, and tissue engineering. Major drug companies, such as Alergan, Klox Technologies, Fidia Pharma USA, and Cormedix have focused on HA. The roadmap indicated that, in the long run, the market's focus will be on cancer treatments with the development of less aggressive medicines, which have already been the research focus of companies such as Holy Stone Healthcare and DKFZ. China stands out as the country with the highest number of scientific articles and the USA as the country with the highest number of patents. (c) 2018 Society of Chemical Industry and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd