Increasing Demand for AMOLED
According to industry sources, the total shipments of the global AMOLED display market are expected to increase from 422 million units to 1,536.6 million units between 2016 and 2022.
Specifically, the growth rate amounted to 35.9% year on year last year and the size is estimated to increase 12.3% this year to 473.8 million units. The figures are likely to rebound to 34.1% and 635.5 million next year with the iPhone X using an AMOLED display released last month, and the growth rate is predicted to reach 39.3% in 2019, 18.1% in 2020, 19.4% in 2021, and 23.1% in 2022. The global demand for AMOLED displays for use in smartphones is forecast to increase next year and new demands are expected to be created with regard to smart watches, tablet PCs, automobiles and so on at the same time. The OLED TV market is about to grow in earnest as well.
Under the circumstances, display manufacturers are entering the AMOLED market one after another. Chinese companies such as BOE, CSOT and Tianma as well as Japan Display and Sharp are likely to start the mass production of AMOLED displays in 2019 and 2020.
At present, Samsung Display has a market share of no less than 98.5% in the segment of the market for mobile devices and LG Display is the de facto only manufacturer in the segment of large OLED panels. LG Display is planning to invest 15 trillion won (US$13.5 billion) in South Korea and five trillion won (US$4.5 billion) in China by 2020 to further refine its technology and increase its production volume. Samsung Display invested 14.1 trillion won (US$12.6 billion) in 2017 alone and is planning to increase the amount to 16 trillion won (US$14.4 billion) next year.