The expanding role of surfactants in advanced applications
Vishal Sharma, executive director and CEO of Godrej Industries( Chemicals), examines the challenges of combining manufacturing scale with application science
In April 2026, around 80 % of the roughly 850 small and mediumsized detergent manufacturing units registered with the Gujarat Small Scale Detergent Manufacturers’ Association stopped operating.
This was caused by a sharp spike in the price of linear alkylbenzene sulfonic acid( LABSA), the anionic surfactant that anchors most powder detergents in India. It was a stark illustration of what commodity dependence can cost: when a critical input is exposed to volatile feedstock prices, even a growing downstream market can find itself vulnerable.
For surfactants manufacturers, however, the answer is not necessarily new chemistry. Surfactants are among the oldest and best understood classes of molecules in industrial chemistry. The opportunity today is in engineering that chemistry for increasingly specific applications, making performance, formulation compatibility and functionality matter as much as volume.
That shift is already underway. To understand where the sector is headed, it is worth looking at the market context, where value is migrating, what this looks like in practice, and what will be needed to take the opportunity further.
One molecule, one exposure
India’ s surfactants market is growing. Valued at approximately $ 1.81 billion in 2026, it is projected to reach around $ 2.73 billion by 2032. But short-term growth and long-term resilience are two different things. The market is currently concentrated around familiar categories: anionic surfactants account for roughly 46 % of the market, while home care represents around 34 % of demand.
38 SPECIALITY CHEMICALS MAGAZINE ESTABLISHED 1981