I would agree with all of the above. I feel that both manufacturers are trying to push their customers away from traditional tube testing. We are primarily an Ortho customer. Price increases were 2-3X our prices for last year. We were looking a converting over to Immucor when they announced their increase (and at the same time canceled their Novation contract that had just been completed. The timing is a little too coincidental for me!) As already stated I do feel that we are seeing the results of only 2 manufacturers.
I visited the Olympus booth at AABB, and was told that their reagents were only licensed for use with their equipment. Not sure if things have changed since then.