According to Digitimes, some "industry sources" say that LG Electronics dropped its OLED TV sales target for 2015 from 5 million TVs to only 800,000. LG still expects OLED to become the mainstream TV display technology in the future.
While it ain't good to hear that LG is less optimistic, it should also be noted that the 5 million sales target (which indeed we heard from one LG executive) was never realistic. LGD's upcoming Gen-8 M2 OLED production line (which is still not online) will have a monthly capacity of 26,000 substrates - or about 150,000 55" panels. Assuming 100% yields (which is not achievable, obviously) - that's only 1.8 million panels in a year, assuming full production capacity is achieved on January 1st.
Even if we add up the smaller capacity pilot line, and even if LG starts producing smaller-sized OLEDs (actually currently it seems that at least some of the capacity will actually go towards 65" and 77" panels), it's highly unlikely that will be able to produce 5 million OLED panels next year.
Keep in mind that LGD also supplies OLED panels to other companies, not just LGE. LGD supplies OLEDs to China's Skyworth, Changhong and Konka. According to earlier reports (and cited again in this Bloomberg article) LGD is in talks with both Sony and Panasonic for OLED supply. A couple of weeks ago Panasonic showed 65" 4K OLED TV prototypes that use panels made by LGD.
Comments
I don't think LG let anyone down regarding OLED TVs in the past 2-3 years. That 5 million display forecast for 2015 was always very speculative and I commented on that when it was posted - there was actually no way for LG to produce 5 million OLED TVs in 2015!
These kind of forecasts are iffy at best even for many well established technologies. To expect reliable numbers for an emerging technology like OLED may (as understandable as it is) be asking a bit much.
Wouldn't it be great if we can get a reliable future production oled estimate from LG for displays or lighting. I've lost track of how many times they've let us down.