Consumers demand clean labels on products to gain knowledge about the product that they are about to consume and at what level. Their interest in identifying the ingredients present in the food and beverage products has triggered the growth of the clean-label ingredient market. The demand for natural color is rising at a fast rate, due to the adverse health effects of artificial colorants, specifically in dairy and beverage products. The starch segment holds a significant share in the clean-label ingredient market, as more consumer goods companies are beginning to use simpler starches in their products.

The demand for extra luggage space has increased off late. For family trips and weekend trips, the amount of luggage that the family or the person carries has increased over the years. This is also coupled by the amount of accessories that a luggage requires when a person goes on an adventure trips. Increasing luggage would require the owners to add a roof rack to the car to transport extra luggage. Nowadays, people carry more clobber, go on more holidays, and participate in sports that require more bulky kits than just a football or tennis racquet. Even a couple of mountain bikes carried on a rack can contribute to the rising demand for car racks. All such events demand an extra luggage space, which is more than a conventional boot space.

The energy sector has certain limitations, including high administration and transmission costs mainly, due to the centralized functioning of the sector. As blockchain addresses these issues and decreases the scope for single point failures and increases transparency across the supply chain, the technology is expected to be a noteworthy digital transformation for the sector. The blockchain technology, which has greatly benefitted the financial sector, finds applications in the energy sector predominantly for wholesale energy trading. However, the increasing number of use cases and efforts from the regional blockchain associations are promoting the adoption of the technology for various other applications like smart contracts and digital identification.

Increase in world trade and growth in marine traffic resulted in the transformation of maritime transport. Over the last few years, the use of automatic identification systems(AIS) has witnessed a rapid increase. The concerned government authorities across the world have made considerable investments to integrate the AIS (Automatic Identification Systems) into the ships, to reduce the marine accidents and enhance marine traffic management.

Russia’s food and beverage sector features a medium-to-high level of competition with about 45,000 companies operating in the sector as of October 2018, according to the latest figures provided by the statistics office. The food subsector is more fragmented, with a large number (38,400 enterprises) of both small and large-scale companies. The top 10 companies earned 17% of the subsector’s total sales in 2017. The high fragmentation calls for consolidation and creates opportunities for acquisitions. The beverage subsector is more consolidated, with the top 10 players generating 53% of total sales in 2017. Foreign companies are well-established in the sector, occupying leading market positions. Still, in line with the government’s increasingly protectionist policy, the M&A market is dominated by local players with Russian buyers responsible for nearly 77% of the M&A deals in the 2017-2018 period.

The level of competition in the electric power sector varies across segments. In electricity generation and distribution, there are virtually five companies dominating the market. In fact, their market shares have increased since 2012, due to organic expansion and takeovers of assets of foreign players exiting the Polish market. On the other hand, the competition in the electricity trade segment has been boosted by the liberalisation of the segment in 2007. Since that year, consumers have been free to choose their electricity supplier. By end-October 2018, a total of 596,977 households and 199,957 corporate clients had exercised the right to change their electricity seller.

The level of competition in Peru’s mining sector varies with segment. It ranges from a monopolistic market structure in the iron and tin segments; through low competition in molybdenum and a medium level of competition in copper, silver and zinc; to a high degree of competition in gold and lead. Most players are active in multiple segments, since Peru has an abundance of polymetallic deposits (especially zinc, lead and silver combinations). A key characteristic of the gold segment is the existence of a large group of small companies and individual miners engaged in illegal mining.

Since 2017, competition in Mexico’s light vehicle industry has been intensifying, as an increasing number of carmakers have opted to adapt their product portfolio to capture growing demand in the US market for light commercial vehicles. Despite uncertainty surrounding the renegotiation of NAFTA, Mexican exports of light vehicles to the US reached a new record high of 3.5mn units in 2018. Motor vehicle producers with a faster adaptation and a higher export orientation experienced the best results over the last two years, while companies that relied more on the domestic market underperformed, due to a decline in new vehicle sales in Mexico in both 2017 and 2018.

The Malaysian power sector is divided into three sub-markets, namely Peninsular Malaysia, Sabah, and Sarawak, where TNB, SESB, and SEB are the main utilities respectively. The power generation subsector is based on a single buyer model with IPPs, while transmission and distribution is quasimonopolised by the three main utilities. The government has taken steps to increase market competition, e.g. through competitive bidding for new power plants, ring-fenced single buyers, and the New Enhanced Dispatch Arrangement. In an interview with The Edge in November 2018, MESTECC Minister Yeo Bee Yin said that MyPower was in the midst of drawing up a roadmap to reform the sector. While the previous government had awarded power plant projects through direct negotiation despite having introduced competitive bidding in 2011, MESTECC Minister Yeo Bee Yin has reiterated that all future power plant projects will only be awarded through an open tender.

The Indonesian power sector has been open to foreign investors since 2009 and private producers can sell their production directly to consumers such as industries and distribution companies. The reform ended the monopoly of the state-owned power energy company PLN and was aimed at bringing more competition to the sector. However, as of 2018, PLN controls about 70% of all power generation and owns and manages Indonesia’s transmission and distribution networks. Two of the biggest IPPs in Indonesia are Jawa Power and Paiton Energy, in which large international companies hold stakes, notably Siemens and Mitsui. The role of the IPPs is expected to increase gradually, as they will be responsible for the greater part of the 56 GW of generation capacity planned to be connected to the grid by 2027 under RUPTL 2018.