Laptop, Tablet Screens
“China’s OLEDs for smartphones have strong price competitiveness,” said Lee Chung-hun, CEO of UBI Research, at the 2023 OLED & Micro Display Seminar at the Federation of Korean Industry Tower in Seoul on July 5. “China will hog the market for organic light-emitting diode displays for smartphones.”
According to display research firm Stone Partners, Samsung Display’s share of flexible OLED panels reached 41.2 percent in the second quarter of this year. The Korean display giant remains the industry leader, but its share has stayed below 50 percent for three consecutive quarters since the fourth quarter of 2022. This is a contrast to its 62.5 percent share in the third quarter of 2022.
Meanwhile, in the second quarter, Chinese display maker BOE’s share stood at 25.5 percent, up slightly from 24.9 percent in the previous quarter and up 7 percentage points from the second quarter of 2022 (18.5 percent).
Samsung Display is also the top ranked in rigid OLED panels. But Stone Partners predicts that demand for rigid OLED panels will decline as low-cost flexible OLED panels from China are supplied in large quantities to Chinese smartphone makers such as Xiaomi, Oppo, and Vivo. As demand for flexible OLED panels grows, BOE, which has secured a large number of Chinese corporate customers, will be in hot pursuit of Samsung Display, so Samsung Display’s market share will hardly exceed 60 percent, according to Stone Partners.
China has already overtaken Korea in the liquid crystal display (LCD) market. According to the Korea Display Industry Association, China’s LCD market share came in at 55.5 percent last year. Taiwan ranked second (27.6 percent) and Korea third (13.5 percent). China’s dominance in the LCD market through a price war forced Samsung Display and LG Display to withdraw or downsize their LCD businesses, so China ended up enjoying a share of more than 50 percent of the LCD market.
In the Korean display industry, there is a growing concern that Chinese display makers will overtake their Korean competitors in the OLED display market, too. It is suggested that Korean companies need to increase shipments of OLED panels in medium and large-sized IT devices such as laptops and tablets, apart from shipments of those for smartphones, to avoid losing the top OLED display market spot to Chinese companies as well.
“With the rise of games that require fast response times and video content that requires excellent contrast, set makers want to use OLED panels in laptops and tablets,” Lee said. “This matches display companies’ needs to ramp up production of medium and large-sized OLED panels.”
Samsung Display and LG Display are sister companies of Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics, respectively. The latter manufactures laptops and tablets. Samsung Display and LG Display also have Apple as a big corporate customer, which allows them to supply a large volume of medium and large-sized OLED panels. LG Display, in particular, is in urgent need of strengthening its OLED panels for tablets and laptops to make up for a decline in sales due to its withdrawal from the LCD market and to speed up its exit out of deficits.
“BOE virtually has only one big corporate customer, Apple, in the medium and large-sized OLED panel market,” Lee said. “Samsung Display and LG Display have Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics as their sister companies. This will grant Samsung Display and LG Display an opportunity to shake off their Chinese rivals in the medium and large-sized OLED panel markets.”
The medium and large-sized OLED panel markets have significant growth potential as set makers’ needs are on the uptick. Global medium and large-sized OLED panel shipments will grow 54.6 percent from 22.7 million units this year to 35.1 million units in 2024, according to UBI Research. Global medium and large-sized OLED panel sales are expected to climb from US$6.698 billion (about 8.7 trillion won) in 2023 to US$8.587 billion (about 11.1 trillion won) in 2024.
Korean TV makers are expected to continue to dominate the large-sized OLED display market for TVs. Chinese companies are also developing OLED panels for TVs but they are focusing on small and medium-sized products such as those for smartphones. Therefore, their pursuit of Korean display makers will not be hot in the large OLED panel market, experts forecast.