BOE Succeeds in Mass-producing In-folding OLED Panels

BOE, a Chinese display company, has succeeded in mass-producing in-folding OLED panels for smartphones following Samsung Display.

Industry watchers say that BOE has emerged as a force to be reckoned with in the global display market as it entered the next-generation smartphone OLED display market after beating Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics in the LCD market based on huge support from the Chinese government.

The Mate X2, Huawei's foldable smartphone model scheduled to debut on Feb. 22, will use displays from BOE. It is the first Huawei smartphone with an in-folding display. The Chinese smartphone giant has thus far introduced out-folding models.

Out-folding phones offer large screens even when they are folded and have the advantage of relatively low unit prices. In addition, they are easier to produce than in-folding models.

However, as Samsung Electronics and Samsung Display enjoyed positive results in the smartphone market with the in-folding Galaxy Fold series, Huawei followed suit by starting to develop in-folding models. Huawei initially tried to receive panels from Samsung Display but chose BOE because supply from Samsung Display was blocked in the aftermath of the U.S.-China trade dispute.

Although it is still difficult to figure out the new Huawei model’s performance, BOE's mass-production of in-folding displays has put domestic display makers on alert. BOE took over the LCD market by recruiting Korean display engineers with higher wages and employing a dumping strategy on the back of subsidies from the Chinese government. At the end of 2020, four years after entering the smartphone OLED display market, it passed Apple’s rigorous quality inspection. Apple will reportedly use BOE's panels for repairing the iPhone 12.

However, as Huawei is unable to secure the supply of key smartphone parts such as semiconductors and sensors due to U.S. export regulations, BOE will inevitably share the pain with it. Huawei's global smartphone sales in the fourth quarter of 2020 were 33 million units, down 41 percent from a year earlier, according to market research firm Counterpoint Research. Global smartphone sales are expected to hit 40 million units in 2021, down 75 percent from 190 million units in 2020.