Sony - Page 7

Analysts from CLSA returned from a journey to Asia with some interesting notes on the OLED industry. According to CLSA, spending in the OLED industry has peaked and OLED producers are not expecting to place any new equipment orders in the near future. This coincides with IHS estimates of over supply in the flexible OLED market in 2018.

According to CLSA, Samsung has a current capacity in its A3 and A4 (which should be ready by Q2 2018) OLED fabs to produce about 330-385 million OLED displays per year (11 lines, each about 15,000 monthly substrates) which SDC expects to be enough to satisfy Apple's and Samsung Electronics' demand. SDC does not see a strong demand from China's smartphone makers, surprisingly, due to the high cost of OLED displays. Without demand for larger displays (tablets/laptops) or perhaps for foldable devices, SDC's seem to be content with its current OLED capacity.

A few day go JOLED announced that it started commercial shipments of its 21.6" 4K OLED panels for use in medical monitors, in its low-volume 4.5-Gen ink-jet printing production line.

Following JDI's decision to halt its plans to increase its stake at JOLED, the company is now seeking to raise $900 million to support its plan to start mass producing OLEDs in 2019. According to a report from Japan the company has received commitments from Sony and Panasonic and both Sumitomo Chemical (who supplies its PLED materials to JOLED) and Screen Holdings (who supplies its equipment to JOLED) are likely to take part in the financing round as well.

According to Business Korea, Sony is enjoying "explosive" demand for its OLED TVs since the beginning of Q2 2017, and the Japanese TV maker has reached out to LGD asking to double OLED TV shipments.

Sony will receive a total of 300,000 OLED TV panels from LGD in 2017, and it aims to order more than 600,000 panels per year starting in 2019 (once LGD can increase its OLED TV capacity). The Korean report suggested that Sony may assist LGD with an investment to secure the capacity.

Last month JOLED announced that it started to sample 21.6" 4K OLED monitors. JOLED plans to develop these OLED monitors for medical applications - it will produce these in low volume at its current 4.5-Gen pilot production line, and will start mass production in 2019.

JOLED's CEO, Nobuhiro Higashiiriki, said in a conference that these first samples were shipped to Sony, which may become JOLED's first customer. JOLED says that the company managed to achieve a high quality and long lifetime, which was a challenge due to the printing process used.

Sony recently started shipping its first OLED TV, the XBR-A1E, and the company now launched a new ad campaign, with the title "Experience a whole new world". In the description of the video you can see below (update: Sony removed the video and it is no longer available), Sony says that OLEDs are the future of TV, with extraordinary contrast, deep blacks and life-like color - coupled with a cutting-edge product design".

I'm not sure if an OLED really replaces the experience of seeing the earth from the moon, but there you have it. Sony's XGR-A1E costs the $3,999 for the 55" model and $5,499 for the 65" one.

Sony launched its first OLED TV, the XBR-A1E, in January 2017, and the company now started shipping its TV in Europe and in the US (the 65" model only). The prices (at least on Amazon.com) are $1,000 cheaper than Sony first announced - the 55" model costs $3,999 while the 65" model costs $5,499. The 77" is not shipping or priced yet.

Sony's A1E features a flat 4K OLED (LGD WRGB) panel, Android TV platform, HDR (both HDR10 and Dolby Vision HDR) and a built-in speaker which is part of the stand behind the TV to create a stand-less form factor.

In January 2017 Sony finally launched its first real OLED TV , the XBR-A1E Bravia OLED TV, and now Sony announced the prices of its TVs: $4,999 for the 55" model and $6,499 for the 65" one. That's somewhere between LG's OLEDE7 and Signature OLEDG7 OLED TVs. According to Amazon the TVs will ship in a month or two (which means April or May).

Sony's XBR-A1E feature a flat 4K HDR WRGB OLED panel (produced by LG Display), an Android TV platform and a built-in speaker which is part of the stand behind the TV to create a stand-less form factor. There will also be a 77-inch model, but Sony did not reveal the price of that one yet.

In October 2016 Sony launched its PlayStation VR HMD in Japan, and early reports said that the company sold 90% of available stock within a week. Sony later launched the headset globally, and now says that it sold 915,000 units within four months, on the way to surpass the company's expectations of 1 million units within six months.

Sony's PlayStation VR uses a 5.7" FHD (1920x1080) AMOLED display (produced by Samsung Display), 360-degree tracking and 3D audio. It is now shipping globally for $399 (headset only).

The OLED display market is now an established market with over $10 billion in annual revenue. OLEDs are mostly used in mobile devices - over 300 million AMOLED panels were produced in 2016, most of them used in smartphones. OLED panels are also used in TVs, tablets, smartwatches, laptops and VR headsets.

Back in 2001, eMagin started offering OLED microdisplays, which are tiny displays fabricated directly on the silicon control circuitry (on the CMOS). Since 2001, the OLED microdisplay market is growing slowly and these high-end microdisplays are mostly used in defense, medical and industrial applications due to their high cost. Many high-end digital cameras also use OLED microdisplays for their electronic viewfinder (EVF).

According to reports in Japan, Sony is set to return to the mobile phone market. The Japanese company is apparently planning to use AMOLED displays in its flagship phones that will be launched in 2018 or 2019.

In the past Sony used AMOLED displays in many of its products - including digital cameras, PDAs (remember those?), MP3 players, VR headsets - and its 2007 11" XEL-1 OLED TV, its PSP Vita mobile gaming console, its latest 2017 A1E 4K OLED TV and its high-end professional monitors. But Sony never actually used an OLED in a mobile phone. Ten year ago, Sony Ericsson did release some phones with PMOLED displays, though - for example the Z610 with its 128x36 PMOLED that was not visible when off.