Panasonic to withdraw from the OLED TV market and sell its OLED business to JDI?

A report from Japan suggests that Panasonic decided to withdraw from the OLED TV business as production costs are too high for the Japanese company. According to the report, Panasonic hopes to sale its OLED business to Japan Display (an agreement is expected next month).

This report is not confirmed yet. It is rather surprising as Panasonic's OLED business is focused on TV panels, while Japan Display is producing small/medium displays. In the past few years, Panasonic focused on printing technologies using Sumitomo's PLED materials.

Towards the end of 2013, Panasonic and Sony dissolved their OLED TV joint-collaboration effort. Following this, it was reported that Sony is withdrawing from the OLED market (this was later denied by Sony). There are also rumors that both Japanese companies are in talks with LGD To supply them with OLED TV panels. In March 2014, Panasonic decided to withdraw from the OLED Lighting market.

In January 2014 Panasonic showed some beautiful 55" curved OLED TV prototypes. A year before Panasonic demonstrated 56" 4K OLED prototypes that were developed in collaboration with Sony (and AUO which produced the Oxide-TFT backplanes).

Earlier this month Japan Display's OLED R&D manager said that while JDI is focused on high-res LCDs for the medium-term, the main focus of the company for the long term is on OLED displays. JDI is using LG's WRGB technology and currently JDI sees OLEDs as still too expensive, and there are still issues with lifetime and uniformity.