OLED Smartphones - introduction and industry news - Page 14

In early 2021 we hoped that by the end of the year, we'll see some commercial rollable OLED smartphones. LG Electronics aimed to be the first company to release such a advice, hoping to launch it in early 2021.

Later in 2021 LG Electronics closed its smartphone business, and the rollable OLED phone project was scrapped. LG is still offering the rollable OLED TV, but this uses a completely different production process, and is extremely pricey (it is likely that LG only shipped a handful of these TVs to date).

According to reports, BOE started mass producing OLED displays at its 6-Gen B12 production line in Chongqing, China. The ramp up is in stages, with the plant expected to reach full production capacity in late 2022 or early 2023.

The reports suggest that the first panels in production now will ship to Oppo for its smartphones. Actual shipments will begin by the end of 2021 (it is likely that actual production volume right now is still low).

UBI Research estimates that Samsung Display will increase its foldable OLED panel production from ~8 million units in 2021 to 18 million panels in 2022. This will enable Samsung Electronics to increase its foldable phone shipments from around 7 million in 2021 to over 14 million in 2022.

As SDC's foldable panel capacity increases, the company will also have to increase is foldable OLED module production capacity, and the UTG glass processing capacity at Dowoo insys. subsidiary.

Samsung Electronics reported its financial results for Q3 2021, with record quarterly sales ($63 billion USD) and an increase of 31% in net profits (to $10.5 billion).

The strong performance was mostly thanks to Samsung's chip business and the weak Korean won. Samsung's display business also enjoyed a good quarter, with strong sales of small and medium-sized OLED panels. Samsung's large-area LCD business, though, posted losses as prices of LCD panels declined.

According to a report from China, BOE will produce around 15 million AMOLED panels for Apple in 2021, or about 10% of Apple's total OLED panel orders.

BOE is supplying displays for refurbished iPhone 12 devices, and Apple is now looking into adopting BOE's panels in the iPhone 13. It is likely that the 15 million shipments estimate relies on Apple's approval of BOE's iPhone 13 panels, and even so it might be a bit optimistic that BOE will supply so many panels by year's end.

UBI Research estimates that Samsung Display shipped 124.76 million smartphone AMOLED panels in Q3 2021, an increase of 24.6% from the previous quarter, enjoying high demand from Apple for its iPhone 13 series.

SDC produced and shipped 62.63 million rigid panels (or about 50% of its total shipments), for low-end and mid-tier smartphones. Flexible OLED shipments were 58.2 million units (out of which 39.31 million went to Apple), and foldable OLEDs shipments reached 3.93 million units.

Our friends at DisplayMate posted an in-depth technical review of the iPhone 13 Pro Max display. The 6.7-inch 1284x2778 10Hz-120Hz 1200 nits LTPO AMOLED receives DisplayMate's highest display performance grade of A+.

DisplayMate says that the new display outperforms the display adopted by Apple in last year's iPhone 12 Pro Max. The iPhone 13 Pro display's new adaptive 120Hz refresh rate which results in a 25% boost to power efficiency. The new display is also brighter by 27% and enjoys a higher absolute color accuracy. The size of the notch was also reduced by 20%.

According to reports from Korea, Apple has given BOE a "conditional approval" for iPhone panel supply. BOE hasn't been able to meet 100% of Apple's requirements, but it is now given time to fix these issues, and may be able to become a supplier to Apple if all goes well.

Even if BOE manage to satisfy Apple, it will take some time and so it is likely that it won't receive large orders for the iPhone 13 series. Apple currently buys all of its iPhone AMOLED panels from Samsung Display and LG Display. BOE aims to supply the panels for the standard iPhone 13 (not the Pro series).

Apple introduced its latest iPhones, with four models, all featuring AMOLED displays. We'll start with the iPhone 13 which features a 6.1" Super Retina 1200 nits 1170x2532 (460 PPI) AMOLED display. The iPhone 13 mini offer similar specifications, with a 5.4" 1080x2340 1200 nits AMOLED (476 PPI) displays.

The iPhone 13 Pro features a higher-end 6.1" 1170x2532 (460 PPI) 10Hz-120Hz 1200 nits LTPO AMOLED display, and the iPhone 13 Pro Max gets a larger 6.7-inch 1284x2778 (258 PPI) LTPO AMOLED.

DSCC says that demand for Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold3 and the Galaxy Z Flip 3 is very strong in Korea, with pre-orders in the first seven days reaching over 900,000 units. Demand in India is strong as well.

DSCC sees Samsung's foldable OLED production volume up dramatically from July compared to last year. In fact the volume in July was higher than the combined volume of the production in January-July 2021. From August 2021, DSCC sees production of over 1 million foldablephones per month.