OLED TV: Introduction and Industry News - Page 32

Yesterday at the OLED Korea conference, LG Display detailed its future plans for its OLED TV business - and besides the expected flexible, transparent, rollable and 8K panels, the company also said it plans to start producing 48" OLED TV panels:

This is the first time we hear of such plans, and it will be very good news to the many consumer who waited patiently for smaller OLED TVs.

The first day of the OLED Korea 2019 conference is almost over - with some interesting lectures and talks by leading OLED companies and professionals. Here are some of the things under discussion today (highlights only):

• Some believe there will be a real market for >$2,000 foldable OLED devices, and some call for cost reductions before real adoption could take place
• LG Display is optimistic regarding the future of OLED TVs
• Samsung will not commit yet to its QD-OLED technology
• Both Cynora and Kyulux are rapidly progressing towards a long lasting TADF/HF blue - but it seems there's still work to be done
• Idemitsu Kosan is increasing its fluorescent OLED emitter efficiency
• Universal Display's RGBB architecture is back on the table - and the company now highlights the architecture's low blue light emission. UDC seems more optimistic then ever regarding blue PHOLED commercialization
• Equipment maker's focus is shifting to China as Korean OLED makers will not increase capacity in the near future

DSCC says that in 2018 OLED display equipment spending fell 7% compared to 2017 to reach $12.5 billion. In 2019, DSCC predicts that OLED spending will fall a further 59% as poor mobile OLED fab utilization is still low.

Looking further in 2019, DSCC sees OLED spending to rebound by 111% to $10.9 billion (still quite lower than in 2017) but drop 40% again in 2021 - to only $6.2 billion.

LG did not yet announce the price and availability of its 2019 OLED TVs, but B&H photo in the US now lists LG's OLED TV range - ready for pre-orders.

So first up we have the basic model, the OLED C9. The 55" model costs $2,496.99 while the 65" one costs $3,496.99 and the 77" costs $6,996.99. The C9 is LG's basic 2019 OLED TV, based on LG's 2nd-gen Alpha 9 intelligent processor which enables LG's ThinQ AI to offer new display algorithms and Amazon's Alexa and Google's Assistant.

DSCC has updated its OLED market forecast for 2019, and the company now expects OLED revenues to reach $28.6 billion (up from $26.5 billion in 2018 - but lower than DSCC's previous estimate). In terms of area shipments, 2019 will see a 25% increase compared to 2018, with strong growth in both the TV and smartphone market.

Looking at OLED applications, TVs will have a market share of 42% in terms of area production, but only 9% in terms of revenues. All OLED production will reach 572 million units, growing by 16% compared to 2018.

Universal Display reported its financial results for Q4 2018 - with revenues of $70.1 million and a net income of $19.2 million. UDC increased its quarterly dividend to $0.1 per share, and expects its 2019 revenues to be in the range of $325 to $350 million.

UDC recently adopted a new accounting standard (ASC 606) which lowers its revenue and income in the early stage of each royalty and material sales contact.

DSCC says that in January 2019 flexible OLED utilization rates dropped to 39% - due to seasonal weakness and Apple's slow iPhone sales. CLSA says that February will another bad month and utilization rates will even drop slightly to 37%. In March things will improve to almost 50% - following the launch of Samsung's Galaxy S10.

Looking at the entire quarter, DSCC sees utilization rates dropping from 68% in Q4 2018 to 41% in Q1 2019. Glass input for all flexible OLED fabs will be down 3% from last year. Rigid OLED utilization rates have been up in 2019 - from 44% in December 2018 to 49% in January 2019, and DSCC sees it continuing to climb in Q1 2019, as a result of increased adoption of rigid OLED by Chinese smartphone makers.

Panasonic officially announced its complete 2019 OLED TV lineup - which includes four TVs. All of Panasonic's 2019 TVs are available in 55" and 65" and feature Panasonic's "ultra-powerful" HCX PRO Intelligent processor, HDR, HDR10+, Dolby Vision, HLG, HLG photo and are fine tuned by Hollywood colorist Stefan Sonnenfeld.

The four models are the GZ950, GZ1000, GZ1500 and GZ2000. The GZ950 is the "entry-level" model, while the the GZ2000 is Panasonic's flagship TV which offers an "extremely high image quality and color accuracy" and very high end audio. Interestingly the GZ2000 uses a "bespoke Professional Edition 4K OLED panel exclusively customized by Panasonic R&D engineers". The panels are WRGB AMOLEDs made by LGD.

According to reports, Samsung Display will hold an investment review committee on April 2019 to decide whether to go ahead with plans to start producing QD-OLED TV panels. If the plan is approved, Samsung will start installing production equipment towards the end of 2019, with mass production starting by the end of 2020 or early 2021.

According to earlier reports, Samsung aimed to start pilot production of QD-OLED TV panels in 2019. It's not clear whether the new reports suggest a delay or whether they only refer to the mass production step, with pilot production proceeding as planned.

At CES 2019, LG Electronics announced its first rollable TV (and the world's first rollable OLED device), the 65" Signature OLED TV R. Market analysts from IHS estimate that producing each 65" rollable OLED TV will cost over $3,000 - more than three times the cost of production of LG's regular 65" OLED TV panels.

LG's new TV can roll up into its base, and has three viewing options - full view, line view and zero view. In Line View, there are six different modes, in which the TV can show the weather, the time, a home dashboard and more. Like the rest of LG's 2019 OLED range, the OLED TV R is based on the company's 2^nd-gen Alpha 9 intelligent processor the enables LG's ThinQ AI to offer new display algorithms and Amazon's Alexa and Google's Assistant.