BidSkim
Free report
Service market

Laboratory equipment contracts

UK public sector · 212 contracts awarded in the 12 months to 6 October 2026

Covering 600+ buyer portals · 5 years of records · Updated 6 October 2026 · How we count

Contracts awarded
212
Last 12 months
Median contract
£50k
Recorded value
Recorded value
£33.0m
207 of 211 main-service contracts have a published value
Buyers
60
Suppliers
90

BidSkim assigns contracts to services from the notice text. How services are assigned

What stands out

  • The five suppliers that won the most laboratory equipment contracts took 29% of them (61 of 212).
  • Contracts awarded per quarter fell 39% from the first half of the period to the second.
  • The median contract, £50k, is 53% below the median across healthcare contracts (£106k).
  • London had the most contracts: 50, or 24% of the total.

Who buys laboratory equipment

By contracts awarded, the 12 months to 6 October 2026.

  1. 1UK Health Security Agency43 contracts
  2. 2UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)23 contracts
  3. 3Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA)13 contracts
  4. 4Sellafield Ltd12 contracts
  5. 5Nuclear Restoration Services8 contracts
  6. 6Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust8 contracts
  7. 7Scottish Government6 contracts
  8. 8Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl)6 contracts
  9. 9NPL Management Limited5 contracts
  10. 10University of Edinburgh5 contracts

Top laboratory equipment contractors by contracts won

The 12 months to 6 October 2026.

  1. 1Wolflabs22 contracts
  2. 2Beckman Coulter12 contracts
  3. 3Scientific Laboratory Supplies12 contracts
  4. 4Hamilton Sales and Service UK Ltd8 contracts
  5. 5AMETEK7 contracts
  6. 6SPT Labtech6 contracts
  7. 7Southern Scientific Ltd.6 contracts
  8. 8Thermo Fisher Scientific6 contracts
  9. 9Phoenix Dosimetry5 contracts
  10. 10Bio Molecular Systems Limited5 contracts

Latest and largest awards

Each links to the official notice.

Latest

Largest

Contracts awarded by quarter

46Q4 2025*83Q1 202632Q2 202651Q3 20260Q4 2026*
* part quarter

Where the contracts were awarded

England 181 · Scotland 22 · Wales 8 · Northern Ireland 1

London50South West31North West27East of England14Scotland14South East12North East8Yorkshire and The Humber7Wales7West Midlands6East Midlands2Northern Ireland1UK-wide or not stated33

What is included

Benchtop and room-scale equipment used across laboratories: centrifuges, incubators, circulators, safety cabinets and clean-air workstations, pipettes, liquid handling robots, lab water systems, glassware washers and growth rooms, plus laboratory radiation detection and dosimetry processing equipment and forensic examination equipment such as fuming cabinets and forensic light sources.

  • Centrifuges and ultracentrifuges
  • Incubators
  • Heating and refrigerated circulators
  • Microbiological safety cabinets and IVF workstations
  • Pipettes
  • Liquid handling robots
  • Purified water systems
  • Laboratory glassware washers
  • Plant growth rooms
  • Radiation safety and detection instruments
  • TLD dosimetry processing equipment
  • Superglue fuming cabinets
  • Forensic laser and light sources

What is not included

  • Fridges and freezers (hlt.lab.cold-storage-temperature-monitoring)
  • Fitted benching and fume cupboards (con.build.specialist-room-refurbishment)
  • Pipette servicing (hlt.lab.equipment-servicing-calibration)
  • Personal dosimetry services (hlt.acute.medical-physics-radiation-protection)
  • Radiation protection adviser services (csl.tech.radiation-protection-advice)
  • Neonatal incubators (hlt.equip.ventilators-anaesthesia-and-respiratory-equipment)
  • Security trace detection (sec.screen.trace-detection)
  • Forensic science services for prosecutions (outside the 16 industries)