[China Trend Report] Significant Reduction of BOE’s Panel Supply to Apple in February and March due to Touch IC Supply Issue

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According to the ‘China Trend Report’ published by UBI Research, BOE B11 (Mianyang) plant is experiencing difficulties in supplying quantities to Apple due to the supply and demand problem of Touch IC. The report analyzed that BOE’s shipments to Apple have decreased significantly due to the supply and demand problem of Touch IC. As a result, shipments are expected to fall far short of the 2022 target set by BOE.

Along with the Touch IC supply issue, the overall shipments of major Chinese panel makers are also on the decline. According to the report, the total shipment of OLED panels for smartphones in China in January this year was 12.7 million units, a decrease of 27% compared to 17.4 million units in December last year.

The ‘China Trend Report’ provides various information on China’s display industry trends. It covers the latest issues of major Chinese panel makers, including BOE’s reduced shipments to Apple, line trends and shipments, equipment disclosures, and new product lists. The report can be inquired on the UBI Research website.

Foldable Phones Predicted to Exceed 100 Million Units by 2026

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According to UBI Research’s “1Q22 Small OLED Display Market Track” Small OLED Display (10-inches or smaller watch, smartphone, foldable phone, etc.) shipment in 2021 was 746 million, a 34.4% increase from the previous year’s 555 million. The reason for the increase in shipments compared to 2020 can be attributed to the increased sales of iPhone 12, iPhone13, and the unexpectedly strong sales of Galaxy Z’s Fold 3 and Flip 3.

Compared to the previous year, Small OLED sales in 2021 was up from $26.5 billion to $38.1 billion, a 43.9% increase.

Graphs are categorized by application product; Watch, Smartphone, Foldable Phone.

Since 2019, foldable phones have been on an upward trend. The market for foldable phones in 2021 exceeded 10 million units, accounting for 1.4% of all small displays. It is predicted that foldable phones’ yearly upward trend will result in exceeding 100 million units by 2026, accounting for 9.7% of all small displays.

“1Q 2022, Small OLED Display Market Track” analyzes the production capacity for 10-inches or smaller OLED Displays. Quarterly sales market and shipment market were investigated by these categories; major panel makers, country, generation, substrate, TFT technology (LTPO and LTPS), and by application products (watch, smartphone, foldable phone).

An analysis of ASP and OLED supply/demand by application is also provided. Small OLED Display market forecast data is predicted until 2026 on Excel.

[UBI Research China Trend Report] Chinese Panel Makers’ Total Shipments of OLED Panels for Smartphones in the Fourth Quarter of 2021 Increased by 26% Compared to the Third Quarter

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26% Increase in Total Shipments of Chinese OLED Panels for Smartphones in the Fourth Quarter compared to the Third Quarter

 

According to UBI Research’s ‘February 1st China Trend Report’, total shipments of OLED panels for smartphones by Chinese panel makers in the fourth quarter of 2021 were 44.8 million units, a 26% increase from 35.57 million units in the previous quarter. By company, BOE shipped 20.9 million units and occupied a 46.7% share, followed by Visionox with 9.7 million units, EverDisplay Optronics with 5.5 million units, CSOT with 5.5 million units, and Tianma with 3.1 million units.

 

By substrate, flexible OLED panel shipments were the highest for BOE with 20.9 million units, followed by CSOT with 5.5 million units, Visionox with 4.7 million units, and Tianma with 3 million units. BOE’s panel shipments increased the most compared to the previous quarter with an increase of 5.3 million units, followed by Visionox by 1.9 million units and Tianma by 1 million units. CSOT’s panel shipments decreased by 300,000 units from the previous quarter.

In the field of rigid OLED panel shipments, EverDisplay Optronics shipped 5.54 million units, a decrease of 80,000 units compared to the third quarter, but maintained the No. 1 position in rigid OLED panel shipments with a market share of 52%. Visionox, in second place, shipped 5.04 million units, up 43% QoQ, chasing EverDisplay Optronics. Tianma’s rigid OLED panel shipments were 120,000 units, accounting for only 1%.

The details can be found in the ‘UBI Research China Trend Report’, and inquiries can be made on the UBI Research website.

China Aims for the Foldable Phone Market with Multiple Foldable Phone Launches

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Samsung Electronics widely successful release of its foldable phones, Galaxy Z Fold 3 and Flip 3 last year has risen expectations for establishing foldable phones into the mainstream. Chinese companies such as Huawei, Xiaomi, Oppo are also releasing multiple foldable phones.

As the first foldable phone in China, Huawei has been releasing the Mate X series every year since its launch in 2019. The Mate X and the Mate Xs released in 2020 are 8 inches in size and folds outward. The external display is 6.6 inches with a resolution of 1148×2480 and an aspect ratio of 19.5:9.

Mate X2 was introduced in February 2021 with 8 inches for the internal display and the external display is 6.45 inches OLED with a resolution of 1160 x 2700 and an aspect ratio of 21:9. Colorless PI was applied to the cover window. Mate X2 folds inward instead of Mate X’s outward folding display.

P50 Pocket released in December 2021 is a clamshell phone similar to the Samsung Flip 3. The internal display is 6.9 inches with 120Hz refresh rate and an aspect ratio of 21:9. The cover window is 1.1 inches circular type.

Honor released a foldable phone, Magic V on January 10th 2022.

The internal display is 8 inches with 90Hz refresh rate and the external display is 6.5 inches with 120Hz refresh rate. The cover window is colorless PI. Both internal and external panels are made in BOE B11(Mianyang) line. The initial production is estimated to be 50,000 and the estimated total production volume is 100,000 to 200,000.

According to the sales result, the Visionox panel might be applied to the product.

Vivo is about to release a new foldable, the NEX FOLD. Vivo filed patents for NEX FOLD, NEX ROLL, and NEX SLIDE.

NEX fold’s internal display is 8.03 inches with QHD 120Hz and the external display is 6.53 inches with FHD 120Hz. Both internal and external display has the same refresh rate. The display panel is Samsung Display’s LTPO, and the cover window is planned to be 30 um thickness UTG.

It is planned to be released in March 2022, but no official announcement has been made.

Samsung Display is using UTG(Ultra Thin Glass) for the cover window and most Chinese panel companies are using Colorless PI. Many Chinese companies are introducing foldable phones, but durability issues are reported on many social network media posts. Chinese panel makers still have much to go in terms of quality in technology and production cost when compared to Samsung Display.

SDC, 4Q2021 The Highest Smartphone Shipments 125 million units, Highest market share of flexible OLED 50.1%

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According to UBI Research Weekly Report, Samsung Display’s OLED shipped 480 million units in 2021. The highest number of shipments were in the 4th quarter at 133 million units and the second highest was in the in 3rd quarter at 129 million units.

Samsung Display OLED application products shipped in 2021 were smartphones, watches, tablet PCs notebooks and TVs. OLED for TVs started shipment in the fourth quarter of last year. It was the first OLED for TV shipment in eight years since 2013 when they had discontinued mass production.

Samsung Display OLED for smartphones shipped 456 million units, which was 94% of the total shipments. OLED for watches shipped 14 million units, just 2.9% of the total shipments.

OLED for notebooks had the most significant growth in 2021. 5 million units were shipped, representing a 2.5 times higher growth than the 1.9 million Tablet PC units shipped.

According to a quarterly analysis of Samsung Display smartphones shipments in 2021, 125 million units were shipped in the fourth quarter, showing the highest performance. This is mainly due to high shipments to Apple in the fourth quarter for OLED for iPhone. In 2021, 102 million units of OLED for iPhone were shipped and 45.4 million units were supplied to Apple in the fourth quarter. Therefore, the market share was the highest at 50.1% in the fourth quarter for flexible OLED shipments.

Flexible OLED and rigid OLED shipments were 190 million units and 257 million units respectively in 2021. The annual shipment market share was 41.6% and 56.5% respectively. Foldable OLED shipments were 8.7 million units, a market share of 1.9%.

 

LG Display Achieves Record Sales in 2021, Swinging a Profit after Three Years

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As LG Display posted the highest sales ever, at the same time it also made a sharp pivot into a profit for the first time in three years. On the 26th, LG Display announced that it had achieved annual sales of 29.878 trillion won and operating profit of 2.23 trillion won in 2021. “This is the result of the large-sized OLED panels in the premium market, the strengthening of the small and medium-sized OLED business base, and the innovation of LCD structures centered on IT products,” LG Display goes on the explain. While the overall TV market experienced negative growth last year, LG Display led the large-sized OLED business. OLED TV panel shipments grew by more than 70% compared to the previous year, which turned to profit in the second half of the year. This helped reach a break-even point.

Following the previous year’s earnings announcement, LG Display stated, “This year, we plan to expand profitability in stages based on shipment growth of more than 20% compared to the previous year and strengthened business capabilities,” and “From the second quarter, ‘OLED.EX’ will be applied to all OLED TV panel series to accelerate the trend toward OLED in the premium TV market.” OLED.EX is a TV panel that increases screen brightness (luminance) by 30% and reduces bezel by 30% by applying ‘deuterium technology’ and ‘personalization algorithm’ to organic light emitting devices. These are the core elements of OLED picture quality. In the case of small and medium-sized OLEDs, the mobile sector plans to improve profitability by expanding new models and high-end products in the second half of the year and expand to the overall mobility industry. The LCD division will continue its strategy of selection and concentration focusing on IT products.

LG Display also expressed confidence in Samsung Display, which has emerged as a new competitor in the OLED market. When asked about LG Display’s competitiveness compared to Samsung Display’s QD-OLED, Large-Scale Marketing Manager Lee Tae-Jong remarked, “Our competitor’s products have not been released yet, so an accurate comparison will be possible only after the actual launch.” He continued, ”LG Display, which has been in business for more than 10 years is far superior in our overall competitiveness in our products and cost, economies of scale, and customers. We will continue to widen the gap in the future.”

Analysis of 65-inch Premium TV Price Trend in 2021

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Analysis of 65-inch Premium TV Price Trend in 2021

This is an analysis for the 65-inch TV prices for Samsung Electronics’ QNED TV, LG Electronics’ OLED TV, and Sony’s OLED TV in 2021.

Samsung Electronics started with the 4K high-end models QN90A and the 8K models QN800A and QN900A. The entry-level models QN80A and QN85A were released sequentially. The 4K models QN90A, QN85A, and QN80A were priced at $2,600, $2,200, and $1,700 respectively. The 8K models QN900A and QN800A were priced at $5,000 and $3,500.

Starting with the high-end model G1, LG Electronics launched the entry-level models A1 and C1 models. The launch prices were $3,000, $2,300, and $2,000 for the G1, C1, and A1, respectively.

Sony launched two models, the XR65A80J and XR65A90J. The starting price was $4,000 for the XR65A90J.

In 2021, events such as the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Black Friday played a major factor in aggressive marketing by companies.

Samsung Electronics’ 8K models QN900A and QN800A had two prices cuts, the first one for the Tokyo Olympics and then for Black Friday. In the end, the QN900A was lowered by $1,700 and QN800A by $800 than their launch prices. Similarly, the 4K models 90A cut its price by $700, the 85A by $800, and the 80A by $500 from the launch prices, forming an average price of $300 lower than LG Electronics’ comparable models.

LG Electronics’ TVs had also began marketing in June when they were affected by the Tokyo Olympics and averaged a $300 price cut on all their OLED products. In anticipation for Black Friday,  in October they lowered their prices by another $200 on average when compared to their launch prices.

Meanwhile, LG Electronics’ 8K QNED TV 65QNED99UP model was priced at $2,500, the lowest price among 8K models.

Finally, Sony’s XR65A80J model dropped to $1,800 in November, which was a $1,000 price cut from the launch price, but recovered its price to $2,000 in December. No price changes for the high-end model, the X65A90J other than one $200 price cut a month after its launch.

 

Samsung Display’s QD-OLED Applied to Sony’s TV and DELL’s Monitor

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QD-OLED panels, which are being mass-produced from the second half of 2021 at Samsung Display, will be applied to new products for Sony and DELL.

First, Sony announced ‘A95K’, the first TV with QD-OLED in its 2022 TV lineup. A95K is available in 55-inch and 65-inch models, featuring 4K resolution and a refresh rate of 120 Hz.

    <Sony’s QD-OLED TV ‘A95K’, Source: electronics.cony.com>

Meanwhile, Samsung Display’s QD-OLED is also applied to DELL’s 34-inch gaming monitor. DELL’s ‘Alienware AW3423DW’ monitor has a 34-inch size, 3440 x 1440 resolution, a refresh rate of 175 Hz, and a response speed of 0.1 ms. In addition, the monitor supports ‘DisplayHDR 400 True Black’. DELL said it will start selling around March 2022.

As Samsung Display’s QD-OLED enters the TV and IT markets, it is expected to compete fiercely with LG Display’s WRGB OLED and JOLED’s RGB inkjet printing technology in the existing mid-to-large market. Many have a huge interest as to which company’s technology will become the main technology in the mid- to large-sized market in the future.

Chinese OLED smartphones released in 2021, 62% increase compared to 2020

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Of the total 226 OLED smartphones released in 2021, China released 175. This is an overwhelming 77.4% share in the market. Korea released 20, which is half of the 39 in 2020. The United States released 16 and other countries released 15.

By size, there were 218 products in the 6-inch range, accounting for 96.5% of the market share, indicating that 6-inch products have established themselves as mainstream. In addition, 3 products in the 8-inch range, 2 products in the 5-inch range and 7-inch range, and 1 product in the 4-inch range were released. All 7-inch and larger products were foldable.

By display design, the punch hole model was released at an overwhelming 173, followed by the notch model at 31, the narrow-bezel model at 15, the under display camera (UDC) and pop-up camera at 3 models each, and 1 product with a home button was released.

Finally, in the display area (D.A), which is the display area to the size of the smartphone, 194 products belonging to 80-90% accounted for 85.8% of the product, 29 products above 90% and 1 product under 80% were released. The home button is now gone, the notch design is reduced, and the average D.A. has increased due to the continuous launch of full-screen smartphones. The product with the highest D.A was 94.9%, which occupies the Honor’s Magic3 series.

[2021 Visionox Technology Innovation Conference] Chief Executive Officer Zhu Xiujian, “We will provide the ultimate experience through form innovation, basic performance enhancement, and function integration”

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At the Visionox Technology Innovation Conference in 2021, Zhu Xiujian, Chief Executive Officer of Visionox Technology Product Engineering Center, gave a presentation on OLED industry trends and Visionox’s advanced technology exploration.

In the OLED industry trend, Chief Executive Officer Zhu emphasized, “Flexible OLED is expected to occupy more than 30% of the panels for mobile devices after 2023, and cost reduction is the only way to expand the market.”

In the OLED technology change for mobile devices that followed, “From 2011 to 2018, a full screen with a notch or a narrow bezel became a trend, from 2019 to 2020, we pursued morphological differentiation such as camera pop-up, punch hole, U-notch, and under panel camera,” he said. He also announced, “After 2021, basic performance such as high refresh rate and low power consumption has been strengthened, and more differentiated technologies such as foldable and advanced UPC are being developed.”

Finally, the Chief Executive Officer mentions form innovation, basic performance improvement, function integration and advanced technology innovation for Visionox’s product innovation solution, full screen and various folding technologies for shape innovation, visual experience and low power consumption with improved pixel structure and color performance for basic performance improvement, cost reduction through layer integration, fingerprint recognition or touch pressure sensing technology for functional integration, and advanced technology In Innovation, he finished the presentation by mentioning micro LED and saying that it will provide optimal solutions to users.

[UBI Research China Trend Report] BOE Dominates OLED Shipments for Smartphones in October

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According to the ‘China Trend Report for the 1st week of December’ published by UBI Research recently, Among Chinese companies, BOE maintained the No. 1 position with an overwhelming share in OLED panel shipments for smartphones in October.

According to the report, in the flexible OLED shipments by Chinese companies in October, BOE had the most with 5.2 million units, followed by CSOT with 1.6 million units, Tianma with 1 million units, and Visionox with 940,000 units. In terms of market share, BOE was 59%, followed by CSOT, Tianma, and Visionox with 18%, 12%, and 11%, respectively.

As for Rigid OLED shipments, EverDisplay Optronics had the most with 1.7 million units and Visionox mass-produced 950,000 units. In terms of market share, EverDisplay Optronics accounted for 65% and Visionox 35%. Tianma, which previously mass-produced a small amount of rigid OLED, did not mass-produce rigid OLED panels in October.

As autonomous driving technology advances, the adoption rate of OLED will increase

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At UBI Research’s ‘OLED Settlement Seminar in the second half of 2021’ held on the 19th, Park Seon-hong, head of the Korea Automobile Research Institute, gave a presentation on ‘the status and outlook of future automotive display development’.

Responsible Park said, “If the autonomous driving technology is advanced, the number or time of driving will decrease, and the change of the interior space is essential because the driver pays attention to the interior environment of the vehicle. Through the change of the vehicle display, the change of the steering wheel to secure space, and the change of the seat, the efficiency of the space that can utilize the interior space can be increased.”

Among the changes resulting from the development of autonomous driving technology, Responsible Park said, “With the change of the display inside and outside the vehicle, the degree of freedom of space within the vehicle can be improved as buttons, switches, and gear knobs inside the vehicle are applied to the display.” In keeping with, the display mounted on the vehicle is also changing to a large-screen, large-area curved display.”

Responsible Park said, “Displays that secure the reliability of autonomous driving by communicating with the outside such as pedestrians and two-wheeled vehicles through external communication as well as the inside of the vehicle are gaining prominence. By displaying information about the vehicle’s condition (acceleration or deceleration, whether it is stopped, etc.), safety issues can be controlled.”

Currently, automotive displays have a high adoption rate of LCD, but OLED can realize flexible displays, and its thin thickness, high contrast ratio, fast response speed, and wide viewing angles make it possible to apply it in complex and diverse spaces inside automobiles in line with the era of autonomous driving. expected to increase. LG Display is already mass-producing POLED for automobiles, and Samsung Display and Chinese panel makers are also preparing for mass-production of OLED for automobiles.

As autonomous driving technology develops, automobiles are emerging as a new concept of ‘rest and comfort’ out of a means of transportation. While the evolution of in-vehicle displays is essential in such a leisure space, expectations are being raised on how much influence OLED will have on the market as a display for automobiles in the future.

Smartphone and foldable OLED shipments expected to exceed 700 million units in 2025

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At UBI Research’s ‘2021 OLED settlement seminar for the second half of the year’ held on the 19th, UBI Research CEO Choong-Hoon Yi gave a presentation on the settlement of small/mid-large OLED industry and future market prospects.

CEO Yi said, “The total sales of OLED for mobile devices in the third quarter was $10.3 billion, up 23.6% from the second quarter and 64.1% from the same period last year. OLED for phones grew to a meaningful number for the first time to $540 million in the third quarter.”

According to the announcement by CEO Yi, the total shipment of smartphones and foldable phones in the third quarter was 167 million, up 22.7% from the previous quarter and 55.3% from the same period of the previous year. “The smartphone market contracted in 2020 due to the spread of Corona 19 and sanctions by Huawei, but the market is growing out of this situation in 2021 thanks to the popularity of Apple’s iPhone 12,” said CEO Yi.

Comparing OLED shipments for smartphones in the third quarter by panel maker, Samsung Display took 72.9%, followed by BOE and LG Display with 9.4% and 5.8%, respectively. CEO Yi mentioned, “Samsung Display maintained 80% level just a year ago, but BOE is gradually gaining strength as BOE’s production lines are being prepared step by step.” and “In terms of sales, Samsung Display accounted for 79.0%, which is higher than the shipment share, and BOE, 8.8%, which is lower than the shipment share. This result appears because the panels of Samsung Display and LG Display are sold to Apple at the highest price.”

Next, CEO Yi predicted, “In terms of OLED shipments by country, Korea dominates the market with 78.7%, but the Chinese market, which currently accounts for 21.3%, will gradually grow and the shipments of the two countries will become similar in about five years.” He also predicted, “In order for the industry to grow, the top-level set makers in the supply chain are important, and based on China’s numerous set makers and the large domestic market, it is highly likely that the leadership will be transferred to China in about five years.”

In the smartphone market forecast analysis, CEO Yi said, “In 2021, OLED shipments for smartphones and foldable phones are expected to reach 580 million units, and the market will grow by 100 million units in the next two years, reaching 600 million units in 2023 and 700 million units in 2025. We will overcome it,” he predicted.

LG Display Wins Presidential Award for its Automotive P-OLED at the Korea Technology Awards

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SEOUL, Korea (Nov. 17, 2021) – LG Display, the world’s leading innovator of display technologies, announced today that its Automotive P-OLED display won the Presidential Award, the highest honor for the most revolutionary technology of the year, at the 2021 Korea Technology Awards in Seoul, Korea. This is LG Display’s second Presidential Award after first winning the coveted honor for its outstanding 65-inch Rollable OLED panel at the 2019 Korea Technology Awards.

Hosted by the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, the nation’s most prestigious technology awards ceremony recognizes companies, research institutes, and universities that have developed groundbreaking technologies and products boasting excellence in performance and domestic industry impact.

Thanks to the self-emissive nature of OLED technology, LG Display’s award-winning Automotive P-OLED display provides incredible picture quality with real black to give drivers high clarity and outdoor visibility during both day and night. In addition to being more eco-friendly than its LCD counterpart, P-OLED has no need for a backlight which gives it a lighter, sleeker, more premium and flexible design.

Notably, it has received the High Visibility Automotive OLED and Eye Comfort Display certifications from TÜV Rheinland, a global independent inspection service. To leverage the diverse benefits of such an innovative and next-generation technology, leading automakers around the world are incorporating this display into their latest vehicles’ infotainment systems.

LG Display’s Automotive P-OLED display is touted by major global automakers, especially when it comes to high reliability even in the harshest environments. The company’s Automotive P-OLED is already globally recognized for its innovative technology, earlier this year picking up the Best New Display Component award at Display Week 2021 which was hosted by the Society for Information Display (SID).

In tandem with the rapidly growing market that is turning out more and more cars with larger multiple displays, LG Display aims to continue leading the market with its unique, differentiated P-OLED technology.

“We are grateful to have been recognized for the Automotive P-OLED technology we developed to bring enhanced safety, design innovation, and ESG values to our consumers,” said Kim Myoung-Kyu, Executive Vice President and Head of the Mobile Business Unit at LG Display. “We will continue to create new and innovative OLED technologies that provide unique and differentiated values to customers, thereby leading the market.”

Merck’s Blue Ink Material Lifetime Announced 65% Improvement Year-over-Year.

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At ‘Display Insight 2021’ held online on November 4th, ‘Joachim Kaiser’, global application manager of Merck, presented ‘Our OLED solutions – livilux®’. When presenting the ink portion of livilux’s OLED materials, Kaiser noted that “Inkjet printing is the only technology that combines RGB parallel pixel layout with scalability for large display sizes”.

Kaiser announced “Maximizing the performance of IJP devices requires a thorough understanding and optimization of state-of-the-art OLED materials, ink formulations optimized for each application, and the entire device stack” and “Merck can get a lot of benefits from IJP performance improvement from its experience in developing materials for deposition”.

Comparing the performance announced by Merck last year and this year, the luminous efficiency (cd/A) of red increased by 46% compared to the previous year, green by 10%, and blue did not change. External quantum efficiency (EQE) was 34.1%, increased by 20% for red, and 28%, increased by 5% for green, and there was no change in blue like the luminous efficiency. In terms of lifespan, 20% for green and 65% for blue were greatly improved. The lifespan of the red is 4,000 hours based on LT95 (last year’s red’s lifespan was 8,300 hours based on LT95), and it is being optimized to increase the lifetime reduced by improving efficiency.

Kaiser emphasized, “At Merck, we are constantly working to provide solutions to the problems of OLED panel design, such as improving the efficiency of Blue OLED, a new kind of emitter, and RGB side-by-side printing technology.”

BOE will start mass production of iPhone 13 panels from October.

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BOE will supply OLED panels for Apple’s iPhone 13 in the US. Samsung Display and LG Display were supplying two 5.4-inch and 6.1-inch 60Hz panels with LTPS(Low-Temperature Polycrystalline Silicon) TFT for the existing iPhone 13 panels. And Samsung Display was exclusively supplying 6.1-inch and 6.7-inch 120Hz products to which LTPO(Low-Temperature Polycrystalline Oxid) TFT was applied. The panel that BOE is supplying with approval to Apple this time is a 6.1-inch LTPS TFT panel. BOE’s panel is expected to start mass production at the end of October if Apple approves it soon.

As for the panels that BOE supplied to the iPhone 12, EVEN process was carried out on the B7 (Chengdu) line, and the module process was carried out on the B11 (Myeonyang) line. The process was carried out separately due to the yield issue of the B7 module line, but from the iPhone 13, the deposition yield of the B11 line has improved and both the EVEN process and the module process are carried out on the B11 line. The total amount of panels that BOE will supply for iPhone 13 is estimated to be 15 million units, and although BOE has a target of producing more than 5 million units within this year, it is expected to be in the range of 2 to 3 million units in reality.

Meanwhile, it is known that BOE is also rapidly developing the LTPO line. The LTPO development speed of BOE’s B11 line is faster than that of the B7 line, and it is known that it already has mass production. At BOE, LTPO development is at a significant level, and attention is being paid to whether it will be able to supply LTPO panels to Apple’s next iPhone 14 (working title).

BOE has recently expanded its supply of flexible OLEDs to Samsung Electronics as well as Apple, and its influence in the flexible OLED market is growing. As BOE supplies new panels to Apple for the first time, attention is focused on how domestic panel makers will respond.

[GLOBAL TECH KOREA 2021] Samsung Display ‘Display Innovation: Form Factor, Energy Saving, Color’

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At ‘GLOBAL TECH KOREA 2021’ held in September 2021, Changhee Lee, Head of Samsung Display’s Next Generation Research Department (Vice President) delivered a keynote speech on the topic of ‘Display Innovation: Form Factor, Energy Conservation, and Color’.

For the first time in the form factor sector, Vice President Lee said, “The screen-to-body ratio, which was only 50% in the early days, has recently reached over 85%” and “We are in the process of introducing UPC (Under Panel Camera) technology to use full screens in various product groups he said. UPC technology can be applied to laptops as well as smartphones, and he said that advanced technology is needed to gradually increase the resolution of the camera and create the same luminance and color as the surrounding screen.

Vice President Lee said, “In 2010, flat screens evolved into various form factors such as foldables and rollables, and most inconveniences in durability, convenience, and usability disappeared”. In addition, Vice President Lee said, “Active devices such as OLEDs and transistors are placed on a neutral plane and designed to be protected by multiple layers, and a foldable display can be made with UTG with reduced thickness and increased durability”. Vice President Lee continued, “If not only folding but also rollable are made, the volume will be much smaller, and the technology is high enough to be commercialized now”, He said, “Materials with excellent properties that can be repeatedly deformed and restored will be developed and will be employed in various products through technology that can make them mechanically strong”. He said, “Materials with excellent properties that can be repeatedly deformed and restored will be developed and will be employed in various products through technology that can make them mechanically strong.”

In terms of energy saving, Vice President Lee explained that Samsung Display’s ‘Eco Square OLED’ is “a technology that reduces power consumption by removing the polarizer” and “We are further developing this technology to further reduce power consumption” He said. In addition, in terms of software, he said, “When ‘Windows 11 Dark Mode’, which can use OLED display more efficiently than before, is released, it is possible to reduce OLED light-emitting power consumption by more than 25%”.

In the color gamut sector, Vice President Lee said, “The higher the saturation and the wider the color gamut, the brighter the human body perceives it.”, and he said, “We are developing a new index called XCR (experienced color range) and evaluating the picture quality of the display through it”. In addition, he said, “We are developing a display with lower power consumption and higher saturation using quantum dots” and “It has already been applied to LCD and applied to Samsung Electronics’ QLED, and QD-OLED products will be released soon, and QD-LED will also be developed” he announced.

Lastly, Vice President Lee said, “Various sensors are being combined and applied to displays, and they have developed innovatively in various form factors, sizes, picture quality and the application changes have also expanded. Companies in the sector must work together to achieve technological innovation” he emphasized.

[GLOBAL TECH KOREA 2021] Solus Advanced Materials ‘Expansion of new businesses other than light emitting materials such as high refractive filler and TFE’

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At ‘GLOBAL TECH KOREA 2021’ held in September 2021, Taehyung Kim, Head of Electronic Materials Business Division, Solus Advanced Materials made a presentation under the theme of ‘Solus’ Giant Step To Lead OLED Materials Technology’.

Solus Advanced Materials has monopolized the HBL market for over 8 years as a domestic display material specialist. Director Kim of Solus Advanced Materials said, “During the development of HBL, we also developed ETL with similar chemical structure and important compatibility with HBL. The performance is evaluated as equal to or higher than that of other companies’ top performance, and it will be able to enter the market soon.”

Director Kim said, “Originally, we mainly developed ETL or HBL related to electronics, but it was difficult to develop from the perspective of the overall device, so we developed HTL related to hall.” In addition “The development of HTL was completed about two years ago through joint development with LG Display, and it was approved for large panel use in May” he said. He also said, “The panel supply is gradually increasing and will be expanded to the Guangzhou line by next year.”, “HTL is structurally related to g-prime for mobile, so it is expected that it can be expanded to g-prime on the mobile side,” he said.

                                                 

Solus Advanced Materials is developing not only light-emitting materials, but also high-refractive fillers and TFEs. Director Kim said, “The mass production of fillers will be visible from this year. There are various materials such as epoxy, urethane, and acrylic type, and we plan to mass-produce the refractive index and viscosity control according to customer specifications.”

In the TFE sector, General Manager Kim said, “The permittivity of TFE currently used in the market is 3.0 or higher, and we received a request to lower the permittivity of the monomer by 30% or more to increase touch sensitivity two years ago and have been developing it. “The permittivity of the TFE monomer being developed by Solus is down to 20%, and the UV CUT function has achieved a specification of less than 5% at around 400 nanometers, and it is being promoted and tested by customers.”

Solus Advanced Materials is currently expanding its OLED-related businesses to various OLED-related luminescent materials such as HBL, ETL, and HTL, as well as high-refractive materials and TFE monomers. It is noteworthy in which areas these various business groups can shine in the future.

Small OLED performance in the second quarter of 2021

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According to the market track on small OLED market performance of less than 10 inches published by UBI Research, Revenue and shipments in the second quarter were about $9.5 billion and 161.7 million units, respectively. QoQ(Quarter over Quarter) revenue and shipments decreased by -14.0% and -5.8%, respectively. Compared to the year over year (YoY), Revenue and shipments increased by 70.1% and 56.3%, respectively.

In 3Q, Samsung Display’s 6G LTPO TFT line capacity is expected to be increased to 60K units. LG Display decided to invest $15,000 in the LTPO TFT line for P6 ph3. The expected equipment installation time is the second quarter of 2022. BOE’s B15, which reviewed the investment in the 6G flexible OLED line, was changed to the 8.5G line for IT manufacturing. Revenue and shipments are expected to increase in the second half of 2021 with the mass production of Apple’s iPhone 13.

Medium & Large OLED performance in the second quarter of 2021

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UBI Research has published a market track on the market performance of 10-inch and larger OLEDs. Applications include TVs, monitors, laptops, and tablet PCs.

According to UBI Research’s Medium & Large OLED market track, the total revenue in the second quarter were about $1.5 billion, which is a 6.5% (QoQ) increase from the previous quarter and 129.6% in the same quarter of the previous year (YoY). In the second quarter, shipments totaled 5.1 million units, an increase of -3.6% (QoQ) and 40.4% (YoY). Samsung Display’s notebook OLED shipments in the second quarter were about 900K units. LG Display shipped 1.8 million TV panels in the second quarter of 2021.

Although there were concerns about a decrease in the utilization rate of the rigid OLED line due to the decrease in OLED for smartphones sold to Samsung Electronics, the A2 line is gradually being converted to production of OLED for laptops due to the increase in rigid OLED demand. In the first half of the year, two 12K lines were put into OLED production for notebooks, and in the second half, it is planned to increase to three or four lines.

Apple’s iPad, which will be mass-produced by Samsung Display from the end of the year, will use LTPO TFT and hybrid OLED (rigid substrate + TFE).

Samsung Display begins mass production of QD-OLED in the fourth quarter of 2021

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Samsung Display begins mass production of QD-OLED in the fourth quarter of 2021, a new growth opportunity in the large OLED market

Samsung Display is planning to start mass production of QD-OLED in earnest from the fourth quarter of 2021. The mass production scale is 8.5G 30K/month, and it is expected to be mass-produced mainly for 65-inch 4K resolution panels. Since three 65-inch panels can be produced in the 8.5th generation, about 1 million panels are expected to be mass-produced annually.

At the closing seminar held in the second half of 2020, UBI Research predicted that Samsung Display’s QD-OLED will produce 200,000 units in 2021, 600,000 units in 2022, and 800,000 units in 2025. However, as Samsung Display announced in its second quarter conference call that it will also introduce a monitor product with a smaller QD display than a TV, production is expected to vary depending on the proportion of products..

If mass production begins in the fourth quarter, QD-OLED TV will be unveiled for the first time at the CES 2022 exhibition held in Las Vegas in 2022, and the product is expected to be officially released in the first half of the year.

Joo-seon Choi, president of Samsung Display, emphasized in a recently published sustainability report that “If QD displays are commercialized, new growth opportunities will be created in the large display industry, which has been stagnant for a long time.”

Attention is paid to how much influence Samsung Display’s QD-OLED mass production will have in the large OLED market led by LG Display.

<Expected structure of QD-OLED, Source: UBI Research>

QNED (quantum dot nano-rod LED) structure and core technology

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Samsung Display research center is accelerating the development of QNED as the next-generation display following OLED.

The reason Samsung Display is developing QNED as part of its large-size display business is that it is the only display that can produce the image quality that Samsung Display’s biggest customer, Samsung Electronics, can satisfy.

Samsung Electronics’ TV business direction, which has the world’s No. 1 TV market share, is to use QD to make color gamut better than OLED, and to use a display that can maximize HDR performance with high luminance and excellent gradation characteristics on a bright screen.

The only display that can satisfy the needs of Samsung Electronics is QNED.

QNED is a self-luminous display and because it uses QD, it has the best color gamut, HDR, luminance, contrast ratio, and motion blur, etc., and is a product expected by Samsung Electronics.

It can be confirmed by the structure that QNED is the display with the best characteristics. QNED consists of a pixel layer with a nano-rod LED on the TFT structure of 3T1C used in large OLEDs, and a color conversion layer consisting of QD and CF (color filter) on top.

In OLED, electrodes (cathode and anode) and electrode line for transmitting a signal to a pixel are located above and below the light emitting material, whereas in QNED, both the signal transmitting electrode (pixel electrode) and electrode line are located on the same plane. In addition to the pixel electrode, the QNED additionally includes a reflective electrode to increase light output efficiency. The pixel electrode serves as an alignment electrode for aligning the nano-rod LED.

< QNED section structure >

< QNED pixel structure >

< QNED pixel planar structure >

Looking at the planar structure of a QNED pixel, a plurality of pixel electrodes are connected in series in one pixel, and a nano-rod LED is positioned between the pixel electrodes. The pixel electrode is on the pixel wall (PW) formed of an insulating material, and each pixel is surrounded by a bank (BNK) to separate regions.

 

The core technology of QNED is driving technology and sensing technology.

The driving technology includes a driving technique for aligning nano-rod LEDs and a driving technique for uniformly controlling pixels that may have a deviation in the number of nano-rod LEDs. The alignment circuit includes switching elements for each pixel, and the switching element applies an alignment signal to the pixel. The alignment state of the nano-rod LED is determined depending on which alignment signal is given to each pixel.

< Drive circuit for alignment >

< Sensing transistor for checking alignment >

The most important driving technology is a technology that supplies current to each pixel so that the luminance can be uniform across the entire screen even if the number of nano-rod LEDs per pixel is different. It is a method of controlling each pixel based on the data read from the sensing transistor.

[QNED Technology Completion Analysis Report] details the sensing transistor, sensing wiring, and sensing signals that can check the nano-rod LED alignment status on the panel.

 

As sensing technology, there are sensing technology (sensing transistor) designed inside QNED and sensing technology used in QNED manufacturing. The sensing technology used to manufacture QNEDs is inherent in inkjet systems. There are three sensing technologies in the inkjet system: the number of nano-rod LEDs in the ink and the viscosity analysis of the solvent, the analysis of the number of nano-rod LEDs sprayed on the panel, and the analysis of the nano-rod LED alignment state.

< Inkjet system configuration >

QNED has already proven that 4K 65 inches can be driven two years ago. Samsung Display is concentrating on finishing work to secure the screen uniformity of QNED.

Samsung Electronics widens the technology gap by applying new technology to ‘Galaxy Z Fold3’.

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According to the ‘2021 OLED Components and Materials Report’ recently published by UBI Research, the ‘Galaxy Z Fold3’, which is expected to be released by Samsung Electronics in August, has UPC (under panel camera) and pol-less (or color filter on) encapsulation, COE) and S Pen technology are expected to be newly applied.

First, UPC, a technology that realizes the full screen of a smartphone by placing the front camera under the screen, has been mentioned using a transparent PI substrate and various technologies such as laser patterning, but in the end, the cathode electrode is patterned with a laser and the resolution near the camera is different. Thus, it seems that the maximum transmittance was secured. It is analyzed that the transparent PI substrate was not applied to the mass production process due to the high process temperature of the TFT.

Although many panel makers have developed pol-less technology, which replaces polarizers with color filters and low-reflection technologies, they could not be applied because they did not show as much anti-reflection effect as polarizers. The polarizing plate is effective in preventing external light reflection, but reduces the amount of light emitted from the OLED light emitting layer by more than 50%. If the polarizer is removed, more light can be emitted with the same power to the outside, so if the same luminance is implemented, battery consumption can be reduced. Samsung Display seems to have implemented pol-less technology by applying color filters, low-reflection films, and black pixel define layer (PDL).

The S Pen is finally applied with an electro-magnetic resonance (EMR) method, and the 30 um thick product used in the previous work is expected to be used as it is for the UTG. The AES method, which does not require a digitizer, was also considered due to the flexibility issue of the digitizer made of metal, but it is expected that the S Pen will eventually be applied in such a way that the digitizer is located on both sides of the panel.

The ‘2021 OLED Components and Materials Report’ published this time includes not only the development trend of foldable OLED, but also the development trend of mobile devices and materials for TV. It is expected to be of great help to related companies.

<‘Galaxy Z Fold3’ Expected Structure ©2021 UBI Research>

97.5% of 6-inch OLED smartphones released in the first half of 2021

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Of the 122 OLED smartphones released in the first half of 2021, 119 6-inch smartphones were released, occupying an overwhelming share of 97.5%. Compared to the 6-inch smartphones released in 2018, which accounted for 78% of the total, it has become the mainstream of the smartphone market in just three years. One 5-inch model and two 8-inch models were released, and the 7-inch model was not released. The 5-inch model is Asus’ Zenfone8, the 8-inch model is Xiaomi’s Mi Mix Fold, and Huawei’s Mate X2.

By display design, hole model was released the most with 103, followed by notch model with 13 and narrow bezel model with 6. As in 2020, products with a home button were not released.

Looking at the distribution by resolution, 400~500ppi products were released the most with 64, accounting for 52.5% of the market share, 48 products with less than 400ppi and 10 products with more than 500ppi. The highest resolution product was Sony’s Xperia 1 II, which recorded 643 ppi.

In the display area (D.A), which is the ratio of the display to the size of the smartphone, products belonging to 80-90% accounted for 84.4%, 13.9% of those over 90% and less than 80% were not released. This is analyzed as a result of the disappearance of the home button and the continuous release of full-screen smartphones. The product with the highest D.A was 94.1%, which was occupied by Huawei’s Mate 40 Pro 4G, followed by Huawei’s Nova 8 pro in second place and Honor’s View40 in third place.

Finally, by country, China released the most with 104, followed by Korea with 12, Taiwan with 4, and Japan and Germany with 1 each.

How far has QNED completed?

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The reality of QNED (quantum dot nano-rod LED), which Samsung Display is preparing as a next-generation display, has become clear.

As a result of analyzing 160 patents applied by Samsung Display, it was confirmed that the structure constituting the QNED has already been completed, and that the only remaining task is to keep the number of nano-rod LEDs arranged in the light-emitting pixel constant.

As a result of classifying the contents of each patent according to the purpose of the application, a total of 39 types were found, with 49 cases related to device arrangement being the most. The following is 20 cases to improve the light efficiency.

The number of aligned nano-rod LEDs per pixel, which determines the yield and image quality characteristics of QNED, is determined by the distribution of LEDs in the ink, the number of LEDs injected into the pixel, and the alignment ratio of the injected LEDs.

If the distribution of the number of nano-rod LEDs per pixel is different, there is a change in the voltage applied to each pixel, resulting in a defect.

It has been confirmed that Samsung Display has already developed a method for making the number of nano-rod LEDs per pixel constant and an algorithm that can make the luminance uniform even when the number of nano-rod LEDs is different.

In the “QNED Technology Completeness Analysis” published this time, it was written as the contents of the previous report published through analysis of 94 patents and 66 newly added patents. It was analyzed and recorded.

In this report, QNED patent numbers, classification tables, and quantitative analysis data that have not been disclosed before are provided in Excel.

UBI Research predicts $2.25 billion in the OLED emitting material market in 2025

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UBI Research (www.ubiresearch.com), a company specializing in OLED market research, cites the recently published ‘OLED emitting material market track for the second quarter of 2021’. It is predicted that the market for light emitting materials for OLED will grow at an average annual rate of 9% to reach $2.25 billion in 2025.

The purchase amount of light emitting materials by Korean panel makers is expected to reach $1.61 billion in 2025 at an average annual growth rate of 5.8%, accounting for 71.6% of the total market. In addition, over the next five years, it is expected that Korean panel makers’ total purchases of light emitting materials will account for 72.4% of the total. In contrast, the amount of material purchases by Chinese panel makers is expected to reach $640 million in 2025 at an average annual growth rate of 8.7%.

By panel maker, Samsung Display is expected to purchase the most emitting materials with a share of 43.5% over the next five years, while LG Display is expected to purchase 28.9% and BOE 17.5%.

Finally, looking at each deposition method, it is expected that the light emitting material for RGB OLED will account for 78% of the total market, and the light emitting material for WRGB OLED will account for 20.4%. Samsung Display’s QD-OLED emitting materials, which are expected to be released in the second half of this year, are expected to account for less than 2% of the total material market as panel shipments are not expected to be large.

Small OLED performance and forecast in the first quarter of 2021

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UBI Research has published a market track on the market performance of small OLED under 10 inches. The main application products are foldable phones, smartphones, and watches.

According to UBI Research’s small OLED market track, OLED shipments for smartphones (including foldable phones) in the first quarter were 140 million units, a decrease of 13.5% compared to the previous quarter (QoQ), but increase of 32.4% compared to the same quarter of the previous year (YoY).

In the first quarter of 2020, OLED shipments also decreased due to a decrease in smartphone sales due to the coronavirus outbreak.

The reason for the 13.5% decrease compared to the fourth quarter of 2020 is that shipments surged in the fourth quarter of last year due to iPhone launches and strong sales.

In terms of sales by company, Samsung Display and LG Display account for 79.0% and 11.3%, respectively, and Korean OLED dominate the market with 90.3%.

Publication of China OLED industry trend analysis report

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Despite the ongoing Corona-19 situation and the US government’s sanctions on Huawei, the adoption of OLED by Chinese smartphone makers is gradually increasing.

The Chinese market, which had been concentrated in the low-end smartphone market, has been expanding into the mid-to-high-end market as Huawei increased its global market share. In particular in the Chinese market, with only the iPhone remaining in the premium smartphone market, Huawei, Oppo, Vivo, and Xiaomi have rapidly increased their market share in the mid- to high-end market with OLED smartphones.

Based on this growth, following Royole and Huawei, Xiaomi also launched a foldable phone in 2021. Chinese display makers have risen to the top spot in LCD production, and their OLED production technology has reached a significant level, and they are also directly producing foldable OLED, which requires the highest level of difficulty in OLED production technology. Foldable OLEDs from BOE and CSOT are used in Huawei and Xiaomi’s foldable phones.

In the “Chinese OLED Trend Report for 2021” published by UBI Research, the OLED-equipped smartphone, TV, and watch industries produced in China were analyzed, and technology development/investment trends and market performance of OLED panel makers were analyzed. In addition, the size of the light emitting material and component material market used by Chinese OLED panel makers was analyzed and summarized.

57 types of OLED smartphones released in the first quarter of 2021 were counted. This number is more than double the number of 27 species in the same quarter last year. This is because Chinese smartphone makers such as Oppo, Vivo, and Xiaomi have mass-released new OLED smartphones to occupy Huawei’s smartphone market.

The OLED market by Chinese panel makers is also growing explosively due to the active use of OLED by Chinese smartphone makers. In the first quarter of 2021, OLED sales for smartphones were counted at 990 million dollars, which increased by 38.3% compared to the same quarter of 2020 (YoY). The reason for the rapid growth of OLED sales is the increase in selling prices as OLEDs produced by Chinese panel makers move from low resolution to high resolution.

The amount of light emitting materials used by Chinese panel makers has not seen a significant increase yet. In the meantime, production was low due to low yield due to low production technology, but now production is increasing even with the same amount of material used. In 2020, 13.8 tons of luminescent material was used.

Forecast of OLED Light Emitting Materials Market in 2021: $15.2 billion

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Citing the recently published ‘2021 OLED emitting material report’, UBI Research (www.ubiresearch.com), a company specializing in OLED market research, forecasted that the OLED emitting material market size in 2021 will be $1.52 billion, a 17% increase from $1.3 billion in 2020.

By country, Korean panel makers’ material purchase rate is expected to account for 74.3% of the total market, and China is expected to account for 25.7%. By company, Samsung Display is expected to take the 1st place with 45.9% of the total, LG Display to take second place with 28.5%, and BOE to take third place with 13.7%.

By evaporation method, it is expected that the emitting materials for RGB OLED used for small OLEDs account for 81.4% of the total market, and the emitting materials for WRGB OLED of LG Display account for 18.3%. Samsung Display’s QD-OLED emitting material, which will be released in the second half of this year, is expected to account for less than 1% of the total material market as shipments of QD-OLED panels are not expected to be large.

Meanwhile, the ‘2021 OLED Emitting Material Report’ published this time includes not only the OLED emitting material market forecast, but also the development trend of low-power driving technology, the development trend of blue phosphorescent materials, and the material supply chain of Chinese panel makers. It is expected to be helpful for the companies related to emitting materials understand related technologies and forecast future technology directions and markets.

Why did Apple choose LTPO?

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  • Utilizing high refresh rate and reducing power consumption by up to 20%
  • but, 30% more complex process

LTPO (Low Temperature Poly-crystalline Oxide) is an Apple’s technology made by combining LTPS (Low Temperature Poly-Silicon) and Oxide (oxide semiconductor, mainly IGZO) TFT technology. It is characterized by further improving power efficiency by using LTPS with fast electron mobility and oxide with less leakage current.

LTPS TFT with fast electron mobility is applied as a driving role, and oxide TFT with low leakage current is applied as a switch.

LTPO was first applied to smart watches before smartphones. The first device to be applied is the Apple Watch Series 4, released in 2018, and was supplied exclusively by LG Display. Samsung Electronics also applied LTPO to the Galaxy Watch Active 2 in 2019.

Apple Watch with LTPO applied       

     Galaxy Watch Active 2

LTPO technology, which is characterized by low power, is suitable for 5G smartphones that consume more power than existing LTE and is in high demand from major smartphone manufacturers. Samsung Display launched the Galaxy Note 20 Ultra, the first smartphone to which LTPO technology was applied.

Galaxy Note 20 Ultra with LTPO applied

It is expected that Samsung Display will dominate the market as it is leading in technology of LTPO OLED panels for Smartphones, and as a latecomer, LG Display is known to develop panels to be applied to the iPhone, which is scheduled to be released next year.

LTPO technology does not only have the advantage of low power. Because masks are added during the process, the unit price is increased due to the complexity of the process. Manufacturing methods are completely different from existing LTPS and Oxide TFT, and processes are more than 30% complicated. Complex manufacturing processes lead to higher unit prices.

From a manufacturer’s perspective, LTPO application effect must be as large as the increased process unit price. Considering this, it is analyzed that the need and effect of LTPO application are greater (because of the always-on display function) than smartphones. Smartwatches also had a greater effect on lowering power consumption than smartphones. If LTPO is applied, the refresh rate can be lowered, which reduces power consumption, because smartphones require a high refresh rate. The refresh rate is a figure that shows how many scenes are shown per second, and the higher the refresh rate, the smoother the screen transition.

In the case of smartphones, if you play games or watch videos, you can quickly switch to the screen with high refresh rates, allowing you to experience smooth and smooth gaming. Recently released flagship Smartphones are currently supporting 120Hz refresh rate. Considering this trend, LTPO technology, which can reduce screen conversion, is not very suitable for smartphone utilization.

However, in a still picture, LTPS requires a driving of 60Hz to maintain the brightness of the screen due to a high leakage current, but the oxide TFT can be driven at 1Hz because of a low leakage current, so there is no decrease in brightness.

As a result, the LTPO TFT has the effect of reducing the total power in mobile devices by 10% to 15% compared to the LTPS TFT.

To take advantage of LTPO’s technology, new applications and services that consumers want are needed. If it is always turned on and has a function to flow information or a service function to view information by turning on only a certain part of it, OLED and LTPO technologies will be combined and used as an advantage.

 

Equipped with OLED panel on Samsung Display in Hyundai Electric Vehicle’Ionic 5′

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  • Samsung Display’s first OLED panel mounted on Hyundai’s first exclusive electric vehicle,’Ionic 5′
  • Optional digital side mirror to mount camera and display screen
  • Significantly helps to improve the mileage and fuel economy of electric vehicles

Samsung Display’s organic light-emitting diode (OLED) display will be used in Hyundai Motor’s first exclusive electric car,’Ionic 5′.

▲ Inside Hyundai’s first exclusive electric car Ionic 5

Ionic 5 can choose a side view camera as an option along with a standard side mirror that uses a regular mirror as before. With this option, there are no mirrors on the side mirrors. In the digital side mirror, a camera is mounted in the place of a general side mirror and a display is located inside. You can see the back and surroundings of the vehicle using the camera and display screen. The wider field of view reduces blind spots and has the advantage of being able to see the surroundings brightly even in the dark underground or at night. This display screen is Samsung Display’s OLED product.

The contract for supplying OLED for vehicles is significant in that it is a 10-year contract between Hyundai Motor Company and Samsung. Samsung Display signed a contract to supply 8-inch LCDs for navigation in 2011, and supplied supplies for three years, but there was no significant business link between the two groups. Hyundai Motor Group selected Samsung Display as the first supplier when it first selected OLED as a vehicle display. As Hyundai Motor adopts Samsung products for its first dedicated electric vehicle with high symbolism, analysts say that the scope of cooperation between Hyundai Motor Group and Samsung will continue to expand in the automotive industry.

Samsung Display has been supplying OLED displays to Audi’s electric vehicle ‘e-tron’ that applied the same system under the name of ‘virtual side mirror’ from 2018.

Audi’s first pure electric car’e-tron 55 quattro’ was applied with ‘virtual side mirrors’ for the first time in mass-produced cars. Are collected.

▲ Audi e-tron ‘Virtual Exterior Mirror’ with Samsung OLED

When the camera is mounted on the side mirror, it improves the aerodynamic flow, greatly helping to improve the mileage of electric vehicles and increase fuel efficiency of internal combustion engine vehicles. In addition, even if the window is covered by snow or rain and it is difficult to see the outside, the side view can be clearly seen through the internal display.

▲ Hyundai Ionic 5’digital side mirror’ equipped with Samsung OLED

The e-tron is equipped with a diamond-shaped OLED display, but the digital side mirror of Hyundai Ionic 5 has a square display design. When I got on the inside of the vehicle and looked at the digital side mirror, I could clearly see the outside from the inside through the screen. In addition, the screen response speed was also smoothly driven without interruption. It is a structure that can easily adapt to drivers who were used to the existing mirror-type side.

 

 

 

 

Cover window market forecast for foldable phones

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The biggest difference between flexible OLED and foldable OLED will be the cover window material. In terms of price competitiveness, various Colorless Poly Imide (CPI) are superior to suppliers, but in the end, the cover window market is expected to depend on which material Samsung Electronics and Apple choose.

Samsung Display plans to supply only foldable OLEDs using UTG (Ultra Thin Glass) to Samsung Electronics and other China this year, and is expected to adopt UTG as the main cover window material in the future.

BOE and CSOT currently focus on transparent PI, but they are securing technology by continuously collaborating with UTG-related glass processing companies. For this reason, according to the UBI Research component and materials market track, UTG is expected to occupy 80% of the market for foldable cover windows in the future, and transparent PI is low in price and easy to apply to products larger than 10 inches As a result, it is expected to be applied to low-end models, tablets, and notebook models.

 

In 2020, small OLED shipments increased by 3.4%↑, sales decreased by 2.8%↓

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Corona 19 and Huawei’s US sanctions negatively affected the OLED market for smartphones, but it was a plus with Apple’s strong sales of iphone 12.

Samsung Display completed the Y-OCTA renovation of the Apple line in 2020, and the LTPO TFT secured a 30K scale. By the first half of 2021, the company plans to convert the LTPS line from Apple’s line to the LTPO TFT line.

The foldable phones released by Samsung Electronics in 2020 are the Galaxy Z Flip released in February and the Galaxy Z Fold 2 released in September, both in-folding and using UTG (ultra thin glass). Galaxy Z Fold 2 is a product to which LTPO TFT technology is applied.

BOE failed several times without exceeding the approval process in Apple’s iPhone12 quality test, but received final approval for panel supply at the end of December 2020. BOE’s new line, B12, is an Apple module line that starts bringing in equipment from December 2020, and is aiming for mass production in November 2021.

According to the annual small OLED display report published by UBI Research, small OLED shipments in 2020 increased by 3.4% compared to 2019, but sales decreased by 2.8%. The increase in shipments is due to the increase in OLED for watches, and the decrease in sales is due to the decrease in OLEDs for smartphones.

In 2020, the total sales of OLED for smartphones was 26.7 billion dollars, of which Samsung Display accounted for 78.8% with 21 billion dollars. LG Display has sales of $2.8 billion and a market share of 10.5%. Samsung Display accounted for 91.7% with 2.35 million dollars in 2019. Smartphone sales in 2020 decreased by 6.68 million units compared to 2019.

Middle and Large OLED sales growth of 40.2% in 2020

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Although Samsung Display’s rigid OLED line is expected to decrease due to a decrease in Huawei’s volume due to the US production, demand for rigid OLEDs is expected to increase as demand for laptops, monitors and tablet PCs is increasing. To respond to this, investment in rigid OLED lines in A4 is also being reviewed. This year’s notebook OLED panel is expected to come out with more than 10 different model product lines, and Apple’s OLED production for iPad is scheduled to start from 2022, so demand for middle and large-sized OLED panels is expected to increase.

In addition, LG Display, a leader in P-OLED supplying in the automotive field, is planning to supply plastic OLEDs for automobiles to German car makers by producing premium OLED panels, and Samsung Display is also supplying OLED panels for vehicles.

According to the 2021 middle and large OLED annual report published by UBI Research, the total sales of middle and large-sized OLEDs in 2020 was $3.882.7 million, and last year was $2.63 billion, an increase of 40.2% from the previous year. By application, the notebook and automobile markets have increased remarkably, and the notebook, monitor, and automotive product markets are expected to grow in 2021.

Samsung Display’s QD-OLED mass production is expected to be around December 2021, and 65-inch panels are highly likely to be used by Sony. Samsung Electronics is expected to receive only 32-inch QD-OLEDs for monitors, not purchasing 65 inches.

LG Display’s 2020 TV OLED panel shipments were counted to 4.4 million units, and if the Guangzhou plant operates at 90K from the third quarter, the production capacity will reach 8.5 million units in 2021.

 

2020 OLED annual performance analysis

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Total shipments of AMOLED in 2020 were aggregated to 575.78 million units. This is an increase of 20.41 million units compared to the 557.46 million units shipped in 2019.

The first OLED application products released in 2020 are for automobiles and for notebooks. Analysis by application product shows that the market has increased for foldable OLED, TV WRGB OLED, and watch OLED, and the decline is for smartphone and tablet PC.

Sales in 2020 were $32.68 billion, an increase of $2.3 billion from $32.45 billion in 2019. The insignificant increase in sales compared to the increase in shipments in 2020 is due to the decline in OLED unit prices for smartphones. This is because the OLED unit prices of iPhone and Galaxy S20, which are supporting the OLED market for smartphones, have decreased compared to 2019, and OLED shipments by Chinese panel makers have led to a decrease in OLED unit prices of Samsung Display.

In terms of sales by company, Samsung Display was found to be $22.3 billion, a decrease of $4.2 billion from $26.5 billion in 2019. Samsung Display’s smartphone OLED shipments amounted to 390 million units, a decrease of 40 million units compared to 430 million units in 2019, and sales decreased due to a drop in selling prices. As a result, Samsung Display’s market share in 2020 dropped sharply to 68.2%.

On the other hand, LG Display’s OLED sales reached $68.7 billion, and its market share surged to 21%. LG Display’s sales increase is due to increased shipments of POLEDs for iPhone and OLED panels for TVs.

BOE’s 2020 sales were $1.86 billion, up $7.5 billion compared to 2019. The market share was 5.7%, ranking third.

Korea’s market share in 2019 was 89.3%, falling below 90% for the first time.

Kopin’s 2.6K x 2.6K OLED display incorporated in Panasonic’s new VR glasses

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January 19, 2021 – Kopin Corporation announced its Lightning® 2.6K x 2.6K (2560 x 2560 resolution) OLED display on chip (DoCTM) are incorporated in Panasonic’s VR Glasses introduced at the CES 2021 this week.

<Panasonic’s new VR glasses, Source: Panasonic>

The Panasonic VR Glasses are the world’s first high-dynamic-range (HDR) capable, ultra-high-definition VR eyeglasses and offer stunning lifelike images. It comes in a very small form-factor thanks to the 1.3” displays and the slim Pancake® optics. The small, lightweight form factor makes the glasses comfortable to wear for extended periods of time, unlike today’s bulky VR headsets.

The 2.6K x 2.6K OLED DoC is made with Kopin’s patented ColorMaxTM technology for high color fidelity (> 100% sRGB) and a duo-stack OLED structure for high brightness (> 1000 nits). The 10-bit color control, together with the high color fidelity, high brightness and high contrast ratio (> 10,000: 1), enables the much-desired studio-quality, HDR capable VR experience.

“We have worked very closely with Panasonic and Lakeside Optoelectronic Technology on the display and with 3M on the Pancake optics for the Panasonic VR glasses,” said Dr. John C.C. Fan, President and CEO of Kopin.

Wu Di, President of Lakeside Optoelectronic Technology, said, “In the development of 2.6K x 2.6K OLED displays on silicon with Kopin, we optimized the OLED deposition processes, tuned our production line, and delivered the industry-leading products.”

The mini-LED TV market in 2025 is the trend of the premium TV market

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Products with more advanced LCDs appear. It is an LCD that has greatly improved brightness, HDR, and color reproducibility by adding QD film and mini-LED to BLU. The existing top-level LCD used a full array local dimming (FALD) BLU with a local dimming zone of about 300 to 500.

When the local dimming zone is increased to more than 3,000 by using mini-LED, the contrast ratio is significantly improved, and the halo effect is reduced compared to FALD BLU LCD TVs. In order to achieve the same performance as OLED, the local dimming zone must have as many pixels as the number of pixels, but due to the limitation of LED size reduction, mini-LED TVs to be sold this year will have a local dimming zone of 1,000-3,000 products.

To make the best LCD TV, a TFT substrate capable of AM driving mini-LED BLU is needed. The competitive pointer of LCD TVs using mini-LED BLU is a technology that can make the image quality similar to OLED while minimizing the local dimming zone and the number of LEDs. In order to realize the same image quality as OLED, the local dimming zone must be more than 100,000 divisions, and hundreds of thousands of LEDs and TFT substrates are required for driving, so the manufacturing cost of panels (including modules) becomes similar to that of OLED.

If the backplane of the mini-LED BLU uses FR4 or BT and the local dimming zone is divided into 3,000, the mini-LED TV manufacturing cost can be reduced to about half of that of the OLED TV, maximizing the quality of the LCD TV while lowering the price. The TV with the best cost performance is created.

The manufacturing cost of mini-LED BLU for 65-inch TVs with a local dimming zone of 10,000 divisions or less is analyzed at 250-1,100 dollars level, and the TV price is expected to range from 1,500 to 6,000 dollars depending on the size and local dimming division level. In 2021, the mini-LED TV market is expected to form 2.5 million units.

In terms of market share with OLED TVs, mini-LED TVs are expected to dominate after 2024.

TCL has led the development of Mini-LED TVs, but the market will be led by Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics.

OLED Market Enters Adjustment Period from Rapid Growth

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As smartphone makers, including Samsung Electronics and Apple, increased the use of OLEDs in flagship models, the growth of the OLED market, which had been rapidly growing, has been braked.

The third quarter of each year is the season with the best OLED performance for smartphones due to the launch of a new iPhone. According to the display market track of UBI Research (www.ubiresearch.com), in the third quarter of this year, 113 million units were shipped, an increase of 26.3 million units compared to 86.7 million units in the last quarter, showing a growth of 30.4%. However, this figure is due to an optical illusion. The reason is that the results in the first and second quarters were very poor compared to before due to COVID-19. Compared to the third quarter of last year, shipments in the third quarter of this year decreased by 17.9%. Shipments are smaller than in the third quarter of 2018.

The decrease in OLED shipments for smartphones in the third quarter is due to the addition of Huawei sanctions to COVID-19. The sharp drop in shipments from Samsung Display and BOE to Huawei deteriorated the third quarter earnings.

There are also many analyzes that companies such as Samsung Electronics, Oppo, and Vivo will benefit from the reflection due to Huawei sanctions. However, since Samsung Electronics is currently struggling in the Chinese market, and the brand power of Oppo and Vivo is less than that of Huawei, it will be difficult to replace the expensive smartphone market in China occupied by Huawei. Therefore, Huawei’s smartphones, which mainly use OLEDs, disappear from the market, and shipments of Samsung Display and BOE are also forced to decrease more than expected.

The growth of the smartphone OLED market is expected to slow for the time being due to Huawei’s smartphone production disruption, which was expected to break through the 300 million units’ market and purchase OLED in large quantities. As a result, the OLED market in China will suffer a severe oversupply situation.

Samsung Electronics’ foldable smartphone to be released in 2021, with touch pen and UTG thickness different?

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According to the ‘2020 OLED Components and Materials Report’ recently published by UBI Research, Samsung Electronics’ next-generation foldable smartphones to be released in 2021 are expected to be equipped with a pen function.

It is expected that the pen function will be added to Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy Z Fold2, which was released in September, but the flexibility issue of the digitizer, which is an essential material to support the pen function, and ultra thin glass (UTG), the cover window material. The pen function was not added in the end due to its thin thickness.

In order to add a pen function, Samsung Display seems to be considering applying an active electrostatic solution (AES) method that does not require a digitizer and changing the thickness of UTG.

First, the’Galaxy Note’ series uses an electro-magnetic resonance (EMR) method with a digitizer at the bottom of the OLED panel. The EMR method has good touch sensitivity and does not require a battery to be embedded in the pen, but it is not applicable to foldable devices due to the flexibility issue of the metal digitizer.

Unless the companies developing the EMR method provide a special solution, the AES method is highly likely to be applied to the pen for the next ball double device. In this case, the sensor pitch of Y-OCTA is formed more densely or the Touch IC is more complex. Can be designed.

The AES method is also being developed by LG Display and BOE to apply to foldable devices.

In addition, the thickness of UTG is also expected to change. The 30 um thick UTG, which is currently commercially available, has good flexibility, but due to its film-like characteristics, when pressure is applied with a touch pen, traces remain and may affect touch sensitivity. To solve this problem, Samsung Display is developing UTG with a thickness of more than 60 um in cooperation with glass processing companies.

As the thickness of the UTG decreases as the thickness increases, it is expected that the UTG currently under development will be applied with a concept in which the folded part is processed thin and filled with a material having the same refractive index as glass. In addition, in the future, there is a possibility that an additional coating process will be added after the reinforcement process without a protective film such as PET on UTG.

In UBI Research’s ‘2020 OLED Parts and Materials Report’, Samsung Display’s expected change in foldable OLED was written as a roadmap and the trends of related materials were analyzed. According to the report, Samsung Electronics’ application of pens for foldable devices is expected in 2021, and UTG materials are expected to lead the market at 78% by 2025 in the future cover window market for foldable devices.

OLED performance analysis in the first half of 2020

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It was found that COVID-19, which has spread around the world since January this year, has adversely affected the OLED industry as well. According to UBI Research (CEO Choong Hoon Yi)’s [2020 OLED Display Semi-Annual Report], OLED total shipments and sales in the first half of 2020 were 231 million units and 13.2 billion dollars, respectively. Compared to shipments of 230 million units and sales of 13.8 billion dollars in the first half of last year, shipments increased by 1 million units but sales decreased by 600 million dollars.

The reason for the decrease in sales compared to the increase in shipments is because the shipments of OLEDs for watches, which are cheaper, have increased, but OLEDs for smartphones and TVs have decreased. OLED for watch was 22 million units in 1H19, but 1H20 increased significantly to 33.5 million units, helping to increase OLED shipments. However, the OLED market for smartphones decreased by 10.6 million units. The foldable OLED market has risen significantly with the Galaxy Z Flip, which Samsung Electronics released in the first half of this year.

In the future, the increase in line capacity for mobile devices by panel makers is expected to slow from 2023. Until 2022, investments by Chinese companies are maintained, but further investment is difficult to expect as the oversupply of OLED for smartphones continues.

Samsung Display is converting the LTPS TFT line of the A3 plant to the LTPO TFT line, and since it has been converted so that Y-OCTA can be manufactured at all plants, the mass production capacity is expected to decrease gradually, reaching 9 million square meters in 2021.

As a result, Korea’s mass-produced substrate area is 56.5% until this year, but from 2021, China is expected to have 1% mass-produced capacity, and after 2022, China’s mass-produced capacity will exceed 50%.

Smartphone OLED shipments plummeted to 87 million units in the second quarter of 2020

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According to the market track for the second quarter of 2020 published by UBI Research, the total OLED shipments in the second quarter were 107 million units, down 13.4% (QoQ) from 124 million units in the last quarter. In addition, it decreased by 16.6% (YoY) compared to the 122 million units in the second quarter of 2019. This is because sales of OLED set devices decreased due to the aftermath of COVID-19.

However, it was found that the OLED market for smartphones that support the OLED market was significantly affected by COVID-19 compared to the overall market.

OLED shipments for smartphones in the second quarter were 87 million units, down 17% from the previous quarter (QoQ), and 23.1% from the same quarter last year (YoY). Compared to the decline in overall OLED shipments, the decline in OLED shipments for smartphones is even greater. However, the reason for the decline in OLED shipments for smartphones is concentrated on rigid OLEDs.

Despite the sharp decline in OLED shipments for smartphones, flexible OLEDs grew 38% compared to the same quarter last year.

However, the YoY of rigid OLED shipments was -40.3%, a sharp decline from the same quarter last year.

The reason why the increase in flexible OLED for smartphones has soared and the shipments of rigid OLEDs have fallen sharply is because Chinese smartphone makers reduced production of mid-priced smartphones using rigid OLEDs and increased smartphone shipments using flexible OLEDs.

According to UBI Research’s CEO Choong Hoon YI, the reason Chinese smartphone makers have increased their flexible OLED smartphone shipments is: First, due to the influence of Apple, Chinese smartphone makers also use OLED for their flagship models. In particular, Chinese smartphone makers use the name plus or max, which are used by Apple and Samsung Electronics, for the highest-end specifications, and imitate that they are making a product that is equivalent to Apple and Samsung Electronics, which are the most recognized in the smartphone market. The second reason is that Chinese display makers have improved OLED manufacturing technology, allowing them to produce panels similar to Samsung Display’s OLED. In particular, it is because Chinese panel makers are supplying panels at 60% of Samsung Display’s price, so Chinese smartphone makers have increased the choice of flexible OLEDs. The third reason is that Chinese panel makers can supply OLEDs at low prices because of the Chinese government’s subsidy policy.

YI said that the OLED industry will become more active due to the increase in OLED usage by Chinese smartphone makers, but the growth of Samsung Display’s OLED business, which has maintained a monopoly position in the smartphone OLED market, may stop growing due to the increase in production of Chinese panel makers.

Supplied foldable OLED panels to CSOT T4, Motorola

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Recently, the panel maker COST T4 plant, a subsidiary of TCL Group, mainly produces premium flexible AMOLED displays, and already supplies them to Motorola foldable OLED phones and Xiaomi 10/10 Pro premium OLED phones.

In early 2019, TCL Group changed its company name to “TCL Technology” while reorganizing its assets and focused on the display panel business. The production capacity of TCL Technology, one of the LCD manufacturers with the largest production capacity in China, is showing rapid growth in recent years.

It is said that the CSOT shipment in 2019 was 22.84 million square meters, an increase of 23.8% from the same period last year. Among them, the flexible AMOLED T4 plant achieved the first stage of mass production in the fourth quarter of last year. CSOT expects that flexible products will be mass-produced within this year and will enter the market in large quantities.

At the same time, the spread of next-generation display technologies and materials is also strengthening. In 2019, the company invested 5.46 billion yuan in R&D and applied for 2,752 PCT international patent applications

The cumulative number of patents is 11,261, covering countries such as Europe, the United States, and Korea. 

Even in the large size area, TCL applied HVA technology in LCD premium products to increase market share such as 4K/8K and Touch, and launched MLED, the world’s first glass substrate mini LED product.

 Even in the small and medium sized area, TCL’s LTPS production line yield and quality have already reached the international level, and the market share of Incell/COF/Blind hole products is steadily increasing. Therefore, it is said that Off Screen/In Screen fingerprint technology is also actively developing.

TCL Technology, which focuses on premium flexible AMOLED, is focusing on premium technologies such as UDC technology and foldable.

Will Dowooinsys expand UTG lines to prepare for the foldable phone market?

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The cover window material of Samsung Electronics ‘Galaxy Z Fold 2’ which will be released in the second half of this year, is UTG like ‘Galaxy Z Filp’. The reason why Samsung Electronics prefers UTG is analyzed for its sense of luxury, differentiation, and sensitivity for the touch pen expected to be applied in the future.

In 2021, the market for over 10 million foldable phones is expected to expand, and the main cover window material of Samsung’s foldable phones will be UTG. To respond to this, Dowooinsys should increase their capacity.

Dowooinsys’ capa is estimated to be 250K/month for 6 inch cells and 375K/month for 7 inch cells. Even if the 6 inch line will be converted to a 7 inch line in the future, it will be 500K/month. Considering the yield of Dowooinsisy and Samsung Display’s Vietnamese module line, more than 4 to 5 lines should be expanded.

Currently, Samsung Display’s Vietnamese module line is assumed as 450K/month considering the yield, but the Vietnamese module line is continually being converted into a foldable line. Even in response to the current situation that Samsung Electronics prefers UTG, Dowooinsys is expected to expand more lines in the second half of this year, and its location is also expected to be considered near Samsung Display’s Vietnamese module line.

With the expansion of Dowooinsys’ additional lines, the market of cover window materials for foldable phones is expected to change in the future. At UBI Research’s ‘Next-Generation Display Technology and Industry Outlook Seminar’ held in mid-July, it is predicted that UTG will lead the future market at a ratio of 7:3 with colorless polyimide.

LPKF’s laser glass processing technology, makes a cover glass thicker than UTG be folded.

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It was expected that the S Pen would be applied to Samsung’s ‘Galaxy Z Fold2’, which will be released in the second half of this year, but it has passed the year.

UTG, the cover window material currently applied to Samsung Electronics’ ‘Galaxy Z Filp’, is 30 um thick and is 1/10 thinner than 300 um, the thickness of commercially available cover glass.

It was possible to have flexibility by using UTG into a foldable phone, but due to the film-like characteristics, there was an issue that durability was insufficient to apply the S Pen.

In order to handle this issue, a technology that increases the thickness of UTG and secures flexibility will be needed. A typical method is processing the folding part of the glass to get flexibility even at a thick thickness.

LIDE (Laser induced deep etching) technology, developed and patented by German high-tech company LPKF, is expected to be a good example. It is known that this technology is a two-step process called micro-region transformation and chemical treatment using a laser, and can process glass of various thicknesses from 30 um to 900 um without micro crack.

LPKF explains that the part where the cover glass is folded is finely processed with a laser to give flexibility to the glass, and it is possible to design the pattern to be invisible using a polymer having same reflectivity as a cover glass.

If you look at Vitrion’s YouTube video (https://youtu.be/Vh3rU4LRHaw), a separate brand related to LIDE, in LPKF, you can see that a cover glass with a thickness of 500 um was patterned to secure bending radius of 1 mm.

<LPKF foldable OLED cover glass, Source: LPKF>

With this glass processing technology, attention is paid to whether a S-pen can be supported as a thicker cover glass is applied to a foldable phone in the future.

Samsung’s Galaxy Z Fold 2 image leak, internal and external displays become bigger

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<The first supposed official render of Galaxy Z Fold2, Source: twitter.com/ishanagarwal24>

On 21 July, information leaker for IT new product, Ishan Agarwal, released an image presumed to be a rendered photo of ‘Galaxy Z Fold2’ on his Twitter.

Galaxy Z Fold2 will be released at the end of September, about two months after it was unveiled at the Galaxy Unpack event on the 5th of next month.

Inside the Galaxy Z Fold2, a 7.7-inch foldable OLED that is larger than the previous Galaxy Fold’s 7.3-inch screen is used, and the cover window material of the foldable OLED is UTG. The size of the external OLED is 6.23 inch, which is 1.63 inch larger than the previous one.

The rear camera is equipped with a 1,800-megapixel main camera, a triple (three) camera and a flight distance sensor (ToF), and the internal camera is known to be located in the center of the right screen in the form of a punch hole, but can’t see in this image.

Expected touch pens do not apply to this model. The shipping price is expected to be 2.3 million won, which is about 100,000 won cheaper than the previous one.

Published The Chinese OLED Industry Trend Report for The First Half of 2020

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UBI Research published a report on trends in China related to the OLED industry at the end of the first half of 2020.

In 2020, 1Q China’s OLED sales were $842 million, despite a Corona 19 crisis, up 1.7% QoQ and 59.4% YoY. China’s OLED shipments are 23% of the total market as of 2020, and it is expected to expand to 45% in 2025.

This report includes product launch trends of OLED-related Chinese set makers during the 2019~first half of 2020, business and investment status by major panel manufacturers, supply chains for major products, various performance analysis and forecasts, and includes the trend of recently announced exhibition products.

This report will provide guidelines for people engaged in various tasks such as OLED-related panel manufacturing, parts/materials, and equipment fields to understand and forecast the Chinese OLED industry.

Material Science Co., Ltd. develops high-purity blue light-emitting material with a half width of 11 nm

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In OLEDs which are currently leading the display industry for mobile devices and TVs, blue material is still using fluorescent material unlike red and green.

Currently, a lot of light emitting material companies are trying to improve the efficiency, lifespan, and color purity of blue light emitting materials, also next-generation materials such as phosphorescence, TADF, and hyper-fluorescence as well as actively developing luminous efficiency by controlling emission wavelengths.

Material Science (hereinafter referred to as MS), a Korean company that has been developing blue light emitting materials since 2015, has recently focused on realizing high color purity and successfully developed high color purity blue light emitting materials with a light emission wavelength of 460 nm and a half width of 11 nm. Considering that the emission wavelength of the currently commercially available blue material is about 20 nm, the blue material of MS is expected to receive great attention.

The full width at half maximum (FWHM) is an expression of the extent of function given by the difference between the two extreme values of the independent variable at which the dependent variable is equal to half of its maximum value.

And the narrower the half width, the higher the purity.

A typical example is Samsung Electronics’ QLED TV, which has significantly improved color reproduction by applying a QD sheet to the LCD back light.

The blue light emitting material developed by MS is expected to be applicable not only to fluorescent materials but also to hyper-fluorescence, which is attracting attention as a next-generation blue material according to emission wavelength control.

<Comparison of the half width of the existing blue dopant with the half width of the blue dopant developed by MS, Source: Materials Science>

Announcement of sale of Samsung LCD P8-2 line

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Recently, Samsung’s announcement of the sale of the P8-2 LCD line in Tangjeong was posted (announced on June 29).

Samsung has been steadily selling the old LCD line until recently, but since it has never posted a sale announcement, it is unusual to post a notice on the sale of this P8-2 line.

Prior to this, some facilities of the P8-1 line were converted to the newly invested QD display line, and only about 30K of TFT and 200K of CF out of all 200K-scale process equipment were sold to companies in China.

Shenzhen EFONLONG OPTRONICS DISPLAY CO., LTD, which acquired Samsung P8-1 line equipment, was founded in 2008 as a manufacturer of LCD modules , located in shenzhen, China. Hefengtai is known to attract investment from the government of Zhejiang, China, and install and operate a relocation facility in Zhejiang.

On the other hand, this P8-2 is known to sell the entire 200K-scale facility, and it is known that Samsung C&T is in charge of it, and the sale amount reaches 500 billion won.

Samsung is known to preferentially convert existing LCD facilities in line with the investment of QD Display, but due to the announcement of the sale of all volumes, it is expected that most of the investment facilities will be newly purchased in the future.

In view of this information, it is possible to carefully predict the possibility of a delay in the investment schedule of an additional 90K scale after the current QD display 30K investment or a change in the investment direction associated with QNED development status.

Jiangsu LEMENG (江苏乐萌) invests 200 million yuan for OLED metal mask project

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On June 18, 2020, Jiangsu Lemeng Precision Science and Technology Co., Ltd. (江苏乐萌精密科技有限公司, hereinafter Jiangsu Lemeng) invested 200 million yuan to sign a project contract to confirm the OLED metal mask. It was held in the state-of-the-art new district of Changzhou, Changzhou, Jiangsu Province.

Jiangsu Lemeng (江苏乐萌) secured 77,000 m2 new plant site for expand the OLED metal mask production line. Based on the existing G6 and G5.5 Mask Frame production lines, it will expand production capacity and secure large-scale production capacity of CMM. After the project is completed, Jiangsu Lemeng (江苏乐萌) can produce 8000 Mask Frames and 1000 CMMs annually, and the production sales are expected to reach 500 million yuan. Metal masks are core consumable parts required for OLED production, and have been exclusively supplied by Japanese and Korean companies for a long time.

Jiangsu Lemeng(江苏乐萌) is a subsidiary of Lemeng, Changzhou City, invested 120 million yuan from OLED business unit of Lemeng, Changzhou City, the predecessor, and related to OLED metal mask industrialization from 2017 Technology has been developed. Started mass production of Mask Frame from October 2019 and has a production capacity of about 1000 pieces per year. Jiangsu Lemeng is known to have already secured CMM industrialization technology, and is expected to secure 1,000 CMM production capacity annually from June 2021, when the new facility is completed.

Source: OLED Industry June 19

Investment of 43.75 billion yuan, investment of new Micro OLED factory in China

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According to China’s Fujian Daily, a large-scale investment agreement has been recently signed in Quanzhou, China. According to the contents of the agreement, the contents of various agreements including the Micro OLED project, high-purity electronic materials, lithium hexafluorophosphate project, China Datang 5G Southeast Industrial Base project, and integrated circuit start-up investment fund business are included. It consists of high-tech IT industries such as manufacturing, digital economy, and financial services.

It is known that Quanzhou City’s Micro OLED project is planned to divide the total of 4.33 billion yuan into two stages. The first phase of the project is to invest 667 million yuan and build one micro OLED module test production line on a 5000 square meter site. The monthly production capacity is 1 million units (basic size 8 inches), and the production of 100,000 modules is completed on an annual basis. It is estimated that the annual output of the resulting production will reach 350 million yuan. The second phase, which is in progress, is 3.7 billion yuan. One Micro OLED plant is built and the monthly production capacity is 15,000 sheets (12 inches of substrate size), and one Micro OLED plant will be produced to produce 20 million consumer electronics modules.

According to the breaking news reported earlier, the Micro OLED project was also announced at the concentrating cloud contract of Qianzhou City’s major project in 2020, held by the City Hall of Quanzhou on March 19th. At the time, the event was conducted in the form of’meeting site + online linkage of investment destinations’. Vice Minister Wang Yafu of County, Quanzhou City, signed the Huidong Industrial Park Micro OLED business, investing a total of 4.35 billion won with Chairman Wu Wen Tian of 福建恒煦实业有限公司 on behalf of the current government.

Source: Fujian Daily June 5

Samsung Display A3 line replaced with Y-OCTA manufacturing line

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The touch panel technology installed on a mobile phone is an important element technology that performs a user interface function. Touch technology is changed from an add-on type to an on-cell type in flexible OLED displays.

The built-in method in which a touch sensor is formed on a thin film encapsulation (TFE) is called by various names such as Y-OCTA(YOUM on-cell touch AMOLED), ToE(touch on encapsulation) or FMLOC(flexible multi-layer on cell touch) for each panel maker. Unlike the add-on type, the on-cell type touch sensor is formed directly on the top of the encapsulation layer without a separate base film. Due to this, the on-cell type has a higher process difficulty than the add-on type, but it is advantageous to manufacture a thin OLED panel thickness, and there is an effect of reducing the process cost.

Recently, in order to apply this on-cell type touch technology to mobile phones using OLEDs, each display manufacturer is undergoing a step-by-step line modification work. Four mask steps are added to apply the on-cell type touch technology. There are two ways to cope with this process step increase: to install and respond to new equipment as much as the process to increase, and to proceed with the process at existing facilities.

Samsung Display decided to use an existing exposure machine to use the on-cell type touch technology in the existing A3 line (Tangjeong), and is in the process of remodeling the 105K capacity TFT production line. In the existing process flow, a back plane process is performed with mother glass of 1500×1800 mm2 and 1500×900 mm2 glass with half-cutting of this mother glass is processed in the OLED process. Therefore, in order to process the half-cut glass again in the back plane equipment, the jig manufacturing method of connecting and processing two cut sheets is applied. After this modification, the production capacity of the A3 line will be reduced. The amount of 105K of the A3 line that is currently being renovated is changed from LTPS process to LTPO process, and it is combined with Y-OCTA process. In this case, 3 mask steps increase as LTPS is changed to LTPO, and 4 additional mask steps increase for Y-OCTA. As a result of the total increase of 7 mask steps, the A3 line is expected to reduce the existing 105K production capacity to approximately 75K level after remodeling.

China’s BOE is also constructing built-in touch processes in B7 and B11. BOE is in the process of adding and processing exposure equipment, etc. as a way to add a built-in touch process. In this case, there will be no significant change in production capa.

<Production capacity comparing with before/after modifying at SDC A3 line>

Deuterium substitution blue, will be next generation blue materials?

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Fluorescent blue emitting material is the only fluorescent material used in small and medium-sized OLEDs and large-area OLEDs.

Development of next generation emitting materials such as TADF and hyper-fluorescence is also in progress, but deuterium substitution technology has got attention since it is adopted to Samsung Galaxy S20.

Deuterium substitution technology is to replace hydrogen with deuterium in a compound combined with existing hydrogen, and each company has a difference in substituting the compound before or after synthesis or substituting the whole. Representative development companies for deuterium substitution include Idemitsu Kosan, DuPont, SFC, and JNC.

As related patents, compounds substituted with deuterium with an atomic mass of deuterium that is twice as high as hydrogen have lower zero-energy and lower vibrational energy than those combined with hydrogen, resulting in lower ground-state energy and weaker intermolecular interactions, resulting in a thin film in an amorphous state. It is effective in improving the life of OLED.

It is expected that the OLED device to which the deuterium-substituted compound is applied can improve the lifetime by more than 20% compared to the previous one.

Samsung’s QNED, will make a sensation in the TV and display markets?

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QNED (Quantum dot nanorod LED), which is known to be under development by Samsung, is becoming a hot issue in the display industry in 2020.

With the emergence of micro LEDs, followed by CRTs, PDPs, LCDs, and OLEDs as TV displays, the industry is interested in whether QNED could be another new technology.

Samsung Display is known to stop the LCD business and invest 13.1 trillion won as an alternative to do the QD-OLED business. In this situation, attention is being focused because the development of QNED can act as another variable in the future of Samsung Display’s large display business.

QNED uses oxide TFT and QD (quantum dot) -CF (color filter) technologies used in QD-OLED manufacturing. On the other hand, the pixel material that emits light is characterized by being changed to a nano-sized bar-type LED (nanorod LED), unlike OLED emitting materials. The pixel manufacturing technology, which is the core technology of QNED manufacturing, is a method of spraying nanorod LEDs dispersed in a solution into a pixel area by an ink jet method and arranging them in a self-align method by an electric signal.

UBI Research published a report that analyzed the structure and manufacturing technology of QNED based on the patented technology filed by Samsung Display. This report is structured to quantitatively analyze QNED-related patents filed by Samsung Display, so that QNED’s technology completeness and mass productivity can be known.

QNED structure and manufacturing technology analysis report published

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UBI Research (www.ubiresearch.com) published “QNED Structure and Manufacturing Technology Analysis Report”, which analyzed 41 cases of Samsung Display’s QNED (quantum dot nanorod LED) published patents.

The contents described in this report were selected from the 41 patents published, which are considered to be used for QNED manufacturing, and are constructed by qualitative analysis.

As a result of analyzing the published patent, the QNED structure was formed of TFT, pixel, and QD (quantum dot) -CF (color filter). In the published patent, all TFT structures are depicted as 2Tr (transistor), but it is estimated that a 3Tr1C structure will be used because at least three TFTs for current driving are required. The pixels consisted of nanorod LEDs, electrodes, and optical structures to increase light efficiency.

Until now, the electrode structure of the pixel was known to be rectangular, but as a result of analyzing published patents, the electrode structure is estimated to be circular. In a specific patent, when the asymmetric waveform was applied to the circular electrode, the alignment direction and alignment characteristics of the nanorod LED were improved. It is judged that the nanorod LED alignment electrode and the drive use the same electrode.

The nanorod LED used for QNED manufacturing is made of GaN and emits blue light, and the size is <1um x 10um. In order to increase the alignment effect of the nanorod LEDs and reduce process defects, the nanorod LED surface appears to be treated with an insulating film and an orientation radical.

What is the difference between the touch types of each model of iPhone 12?

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All of Apple’s iPhone 12 models, OLED panels will be used and consisted of four models. There are three sizes, 5.4 inches, 6.1 inches, and 6.7 inches, respectively, and 6.1 inches are divided into two models.

Samsung Display and LG Display have begun preparing to mass-produce, with recent orders from Apple. Samsung Display plans to supply OLED panels of all sizes, LG Display plans to supply 6.1-inch OLED panels, and there are differences in touch type by size.

First, on-cell touch which a touch electrode is formed on a thin film encapsulation (TFE) is applied to 5.4 inch and 6.7 inch models. Each panel maker is called Y-OCTA (YOUM on-cell touch AMOLED), ToE (touch on encapsulation), FMLOC (flexible multi-layer on-cell touch), and unlike add-on touch, a touch electrode is formed directly on the upper layer without base films. Due to this, the on-cell touch has a higher process difficulty than the add-on touch, but it is advantageous to fabricate a thin OLED panel thickness, and the process cost is also reduced.

Add-on method is applied to 6.1 inches. A touch electrode is formed on the base film, and is attached on the TFE by adhesive. It has the advantage that the process is simpler than on-cell touch.

<Flexible OLED touch type, Source: AMOLED Manufacturing Process Report>

Recently, rumors that BOE is supplying 5.4 inch and 6.1 inch OLED panels to Apple have turned around, but 5.4 inch is on-cell touch type and it is still difficult to supply for iPhone 12 due to technical difficulty. BOE is developing a 6.1-inch OLED panel and has not received calls yet.

<iPhone 12’s touch types and panel suppliers>

Who is the supplier of OLED panels for iPhone 12?

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<Image of iPhone 12 Pro Max, Source: EveryApplePro>

Apple’s new iPhone 12 will be consisted of 4 models, and all 4 models are expected to adopt OLED. The general lineup of the iPhone 12 is the 5.4 inch iPhone 12 and the 6.1 inch iPhone 12 Max, and the pro lineup is the 6.1 inch iPhone Pro and the 6.7 inch iPhone Pro Max.

Recently, rumors are floating that BOE will supply OLED of 5.4 inch and 6.1 inch general models, and Samsung Display will supply OLED of 6.1 inch and 6.7 inch pro models. Due to the news that Chinese OLED panel manufacturer BOE is supplying OLEDs to Apple, the interest of OLED-related companies such as light-emitting material companies and component companies is growing day by day.

According to UBI Research, BOE is developing 5.4 inch and 6.1 inch OLEDs, but has not received any calls from Apple. In the current situation, Samsung Display plans to supply 5.4 inch, 6.1 inch, and 6.7 inch OLEDs, and LG Display and BOE are developing 6.1 inch OLEDs.

The BOE hasn’t gotten a clear call yet, but there’s plenty of time left for the mass production of the iPhone 12, so there’s plenty of room for the BOE to get a call from Apple. While the production of the iPhone 12 is likely to be delayed by about a month due to the corona incident, it usually takes 4 ~ 5 months from the OLED panel test to the mass production of the set, so there is enough time.

Related information can also be found in the recent report of ‘change in OLED market by coronavirus’, published by UBI Research.

78.6 tons of OLED emitting material demand increased by 5.6% in 2020

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According to the 2020 OLED emitting material report published by UBI Research, the demand for emitting materials in 2020 is 78.6 tons, which is 4.2 tons higher than last year’s 74.4 tons. The material used for OLEDs for smartphones and mobile devices is 62.9 tons, and the OLED emitting material for TVs is expected to be 15.7 tons.

In 2019, the total emitting material market was totaled at $ 1.28 billion, and 43% of the total amount was purchased from Samsung Display. It was found that the amount purchased by LG Display was 19.4% and the BOE was 11.6%. LG Display’s purchase of emitting materials accounted for 60.8% of TV use. The order of purchase of emitting materials for mobile devices is in order of Samsung Display, BOE, and LG Display. This is because BOE has a large amount of OLED production for mobiles after Samsung Display.

The OLED panel for TV only produces LG Display, but Samsung Display is pursuing QD-OLED commercialization using blue light emitting material and QD. In addition, although BOE is a white OLED structure similar to LG Display, it is developing a top-emission structure that transmits light in the opposite direction of TFT, and it is expected that three companies will produce OLED panels for TV within a few years, and the emitting material market is expected to increase as well.

The market for emitting materials in 2020 is expected to increase by 7% from 2019 to $ 1.37 billion. Among the emitting materials, green and red hosts are expected to be $ 19.2 billion and $ 19 billion, respectively, and green dopants and P + are expected to be $ 1.37 billion and $ 1.35 billion, respectively.

[UBI Research China Trend Report] Will BOE Provide UPC Panel with Transparent PI Substrate to Oppo?

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According to UBI Research’s report on changes in the OLED market caused by coronavirus, the forecast for the 2020 OLED modification market is $ 36.7 billion in sales and 612 million units. This is a decrease of 4.8% and 7.6%, respectively, from the expected sales of $ 38.5 billion and shipments of 6.6 million units at the beginning of the year.

As a result of UBI Research’s analysis of the effect of coronavirus on the OLED market for two months, the global smartphone market is expected to drop by 20% and the TV market is expected to decrease by 15%. However, the impact on the overall OLED industry was judged to be only 5-8%. OLED panels for smartphones, TVs and watches are expected to decrease, but the market for OLEDs for monitors is expected to increase.

The expected OLED shipment for smartphones was 527 million units at the beginning of the year, but the forecast for correction is 486 million units, a decrease of only 7.8%. Although the market for Galaxy and iPhone is analyzed to be higher than the average decrease rate, Chinese smartphone makers are expected to reduce LCD smartphones and increase production of OLED smartphones significantly.

Chinese smartphone makers’ use of OLED seems to follow Apple’s business direction. Flagship models of Chinese smartphone makers have used Pro and Pro Plus. Pro is the model grade name used by Apple and Plus is the model grade name used by Samsung. However, flagship models of Chinese smartphone makers that are launching this year are using both Pro and Pro Max as well as Apple. All of these models, like Apple, plan to use flexible OLEDs.

The OLED TV market was found to be greatly affected by coronavirus. Estimated shipments at the beginning of the year were 4.9 million units, but the forecast for correction was 3.6 million units, down by 1.3 million units. A 26.5% reduction is expected. This is 300,000 units more than 2019 shipments. This is because the production schedule of the Guangzhou factory has been postponed since the third quarter due to the coronavirus, and TV sales are plunging due to the spread of coronavirus in Japan and Europe, the main markets for OLED TV. In fact, Japan’s TV performance in the second quarter was below 50% in 2019.

However, the demand for the OLED panel business for monitors that Samsung Display has been promoting since the second half of last year is expected to increase due to the game industry, telecommuting, telemedicine, and remote classes due to the aftermath of the coronavirus.

Merck acquires OLED patents for display applications from Konica Minolta

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Merck announced that it acquired the OLED patent portfolio for display applications from Konica Minolta Inc., a global technology company that provides innovative solutions to businesses and society on 24th April. The acquired portfolio comprises over 700 patent families.

“Adding Konica Minolta’s patents to our already strong portfolio will further boost our OLED development pipeline”, said Kai Beckmann, Member of the Executive Board of Merck and CEO Performance Materials. “With this step we will further strengthen our power to drive innovations in the fast-growing market of OLED displays.”

For more than 15 years, Merck has conducted research and development in the OLED technology field, and, as a result, became one of the leading OLED material suppliers.

The acquisition of Konica Minolta’s OLED patents for display applications is effective immediately. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Apple’s last LCD phone, iPhone SE

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The iPhone SE, the last product of the LCD smartphone that Apple has opened to the smartphone market, has been released.

Apple’s 2019 model iPhone 11 had three models, the base model iPhone 11 used a 6.06inch LCD, and the advanced specifications iPhone 11 Pro and Pro Max used 5.85 inch and 6.46inch flexible OLED, respectively.

Samsung Display supplies both 5.85inch and 6.46inch flexible OLEDs, and LG Display has supplied only 6.46inch flexible OLEDs from the fourth quarter of 2019.

This year, Apple releases a four-model iPhone. There are three types of iPhone, SE2 which started selling this month, and 3 iPhone 12 which starts selling in September. Strictly speaking, since there are 2 models of the iPhone 12 Pro, 4 types of iPhones using OLED will be released in the second half of this year.

Apple’s current LCD phones are the iPhone 11 and the newly released SE2. Of the iPhone models released by Apple this year, only the LCD will use the SE2, and the SE2 is expected to be Apple’s last LCD smartphone.

Apple already mentioned that in 2019, all future iPhone displays will be replaced by OLEDs. Therefore, in fact, this is the reason that the SE2 released this time is expected to be the last　LCD phone.

Most of the latest smartphones are more than 6 inches, but the iPhone SE2 released this time is a small 4.7-inch model using IPS LCD.

The reason Apple used a small display is believed to be a strategic product to target the mid-priced market of around $ 500. It’s currently $ 549.99 on eBay, but it’s on Amazon for $ 399.

Apple’s expected iPhone strategy is two tracks. First of all, in order to maintain the second largest market share in shipments, it is necessary to match shipments with products with a wide market of $ 500. And the operating profit creation is to fit the expensive iPhone 12 series using flexible OLED.

However, shipments of LCD phones are expected to gradually disappear after 2021, depending on the sales of 5.42 inches, the basic model of iPhone 12, which will be released in the second half of this year.

Huawei’s OLED TV launch, LG Electronics, and Sony’s 48-inch OLED TV Launch Will Further Increase the Influence of OLED TV to Oppo?

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Huawei launch its first OLED TV and LG Electronics and Sony will launch a new lineup, a 48-inch OLED TV. As a result, the OLED TV camp and lineup are expected to become more diverse.

First, Huawei will launch its first OLED TV X65 soon. X65 is used a 24-megapixel camera to control the TV with a ‘gesture tracking’ function that recognizes the user’s face, motion, and posture, and is equipped with 14 under-screen speakers to automatically To correct the sound. The X65 used LG Display’s OLED will be released on April 8.

China’s OLED TV camp has increased to five camps from Skyworth, Konka, Changhong, and Xiaomi to Huawei. In addition, Huawei’s OLED TV launch, which is leading the Chinese smartphone market, can have a great influence on the premium TV market in the future.

Meanwhile, LG Electronics and Sony, which are leading the OLED TV market, will launch a new 48-inch OLED TV to make the lineup more diverse. Currently, OLED TVs have only 55-inch, 65-inch, and 77-inch lineups, and are evaluated to have a relatively short lineup compared to LCD TVs. LG Electronics and Sony are planning to target the Japanese or European market with high preference for small TVs through the launch of this 48-inch OLED TV.

LG Electronics and Sony’s 48-inch OLED TVs are scheduled to be released in May and July, respectively.

It is noteworthy whether OLED TV will exert great influence once again in the premium TV market in 2020, such as Huawei joining the OLED TV camp and LG Electronics and Sony launching the first 48-inch OLED TV.

Samsung Display QD-OLED Investment Timing Forecast to Oppo?

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Samsung’s LCD business, which began in 1991, will be suspended in 2021. Samsung’s LCD business is completely closed after a 30-year lifespan. Samsung foresaw the limitations of the LCD business 10 years ago and stopped investing in the 10G. Instead, Samsung Electronics has separated the LCD business to create a Samsung Display combined with Samsung SDI’s OLED and has been preparing for a new display era.

Samsung’s loss of LCD business can be estimated for two reasons. The first is the deterioration of profitability from China’s LCD over-investment, and the second is the transition to a new business with high added value.

Since the display is an essential product in the modern information society, demand is gradually increasing worldwide as the usage is increased. In addition, as the amount of information increases, the data to be expressed increases, so the display size must also increase. By these two factors, the display industry has the power to continue to develop. However, China’s LCD investments have continued to invest in large quantities over many years. In the wake of this, only two LCD companies in Japan, Sharp and JDI, remained, and the Korean LCD business also reached a point where it was necessary to organize the business due to deficits.

Samsung Display and LG Display have expanded the OLED business to respond to the low-priced panel of Chinese LCD companies, and have focused on producing OLEDs with the best image quality preferred by set makers with high brand power. Samsung Display already secured a market of $ 25.3 billion in the smartphone display business in 2019, and LG Display secured $ 2.2 billion in sales in the OLED market for TV last year.

Samsung Display has enjoyed tremendous sales and operating profit in the OLED business, but the LCD business has been in the red for several years. Samsung Display sells LCDs for monitors, mainly for LCDs for TVs, but has secured the optimal solution to replace them all as QD-OLEDs.

QD-OLED production, which Samsung Display started investing from this year, uses 8.5G equipment. This is because Samsung Display’s factory in Tangjeong is an 8.5G LCD line, which can reduce the cost of building an OLED production line. Samsung Display will produce 8K 65-inch QD-OLED panels at this plant starting next year. It also produces QD-OLEDs for 32-inch 4K monitors. Maintaining the TV and monitor panel business previously held by Samsung Display, profitability can be secured by selling expensive products.

Samsung Display started investing in QD-OLED 30K in the existing 8.5G LCD factory, but the total investment is 120K. The remaining investment is 90K. Samsung Display’s additional investment is expected to change in size and timing depending on the QD-OLED production situation starting next year. If a yield of over 60% is secured from the beginning of production, the remaining 90K can be invested in next year. This is the most desirable timing. It can be used without leaving the LCD engineer. To prepare for this situation, all LCD lines must be removed by the first half of 2021. The next scenario is when the QD-OLED yield is less than 60%. In general, when the yield is low, the plant cannot be fully operated, so it does not require much manpower. Since additional investment is appropriate after securing the yield, it is a method of separating the investment, investing 30 ~ 60K, and then investing the remaining size later.

Nobody know what will happen next year, but Samsung Display is steadily taking a step forward to secure the future business.

JDI decided to sell LCD production equipment to a foreign client for 200 million dollars

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JDI announced that it has agreed to sell production equipment at its plant in Hakusan, Ishikawa Prefecture, to a foreign client for 200 million dollars.

The Hakusan plant was JDI’s mainstay factory, producing LCD panels for Apple. The plant was halted in July last year due to sluggish demand. JDI plans to clean up excess facilities that have caused poor performance.

JDI decided to sell LCD production equipment to Apple first and real estate to Sharp later, but negotiations have been delayed due to the effect of the corona virus.

The Hakusan plant was built with Apple’s $ 1.5 billion funds and operated at the end of 2016. But because Apple’s utilization of OLED panels on iPhones has increased in recent years, utilization rate of Hakusan plant has decreased. Moreover, it was a burden for JDI to repay the advances to Apple at the end of February 2020. It is a policy that the funds obtained through the sale of the equipment will be used to repay advances.

Foldable OLED UTG market expected to grow rapidly

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As Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy Z Flip continues to be sold out in the market, Samsung Display’s foldable OLED cover window UTG (ultra thin glass) market is expected to grow rapidly.

According to UBI Research’s first quarter 2020 parts and materials market track, the UTG market is expected to grow to $ 160 million this year and to $ 640 million in 2023.

In Samsung Electronics’ first-generation foldable phone, the Galaxy folder, a transparent PI made of plastic was used as the cover window, but in the second-generation foldable phone, the Galaxy Z Flip, the cover window was replaced with UTG. The reason Samsung Display changed the transparent PI to UTG is that the glare of the glass cover when the screen is off gives a much more luxurious feeling than the transparent PI.

Samsung Display used transparent PI produced by Dongwoo Fine-Chem for the first-generation foldable OLED, but changed it to UTG produced by Dowooinsys technology. Glass for UTG is provided by Shott. To strengthen the foldable OLED ecosystem, Samsung Display secured a 27.7% stake in Dowooinsys and secured its position as the largest shareholder. Foldable OLED latecomers are now only developing out-folding type foldable OLEDs as transparent PI, but Samsung Display has changed materials to prevent latecomers from following the foldable OLED market at all.

3F starts construction of 1,100 tons of PI production plant annually

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China has entered the localization of PI. Although it has grown to the world’s highest level of LCD production, it is still only a few percent in the OLED panel market. In the OLED field, the Chinese government continues to invest heavily in panel makers, mainly BOE, to help China become the best production base. However, the supply chain of parts and materials that are essential for producing OLED is very poor.

The Chinese government has invested in a PI plant to make flexible substrates, which is the first step in flexible OLED manufacturing.

3F New Material, located in Changshu, started a project capable of producing 1,100 tons of PI per year. The project involved construction of a three-story production plant on a site of 2408 square meters with a total investment of 216 million yuan. The total building area is 7224 square meters, and after completion of the factory, it will have the capacity to produce 1,000 tons of PI for the substrate and 100 tons of transparent PI for the cover window.

Samsung Display, LG Display, and OLED sales depend on the operation of the Vietnamese module factory

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Samsung Display and LG Display, whose business trip to Vietnam was blocked by the Corona virus, are trying to prevent delays in OLED production by launching charter.

Samsung Display, which produces OLED for mobile devices, operates a line of OLED modules for smartphones in Bac Ninh, Vietnam, and Samsung Electronics also has smartphone manufacturing plants in Bac Ninh and Tai Nguyen. Samsung Display installed the foldable OLED module line 30K in December 2019. In this module factory, Samsung Display is producing foldable OLED modules for Galaxy Z flips, which Samsung Electronics has begun selling this year. LG Display invested a total of KRW 1 trillion in Haiphong, Vietnam in May 2016 to produce the OLED module, built a module factory and started operation in September of that year.

The Vietnamese government is blocking entry from Korea to prevent the spread of coronavirus. This has made it difficult for Korean companies with factories in Vietnam to travel to Vietnam. However, Samsung Display and LG Display are preparing a charter for the normal operation of their OLED module factory and are on a business trip to Vietnam.

If Samsung Display is unable to manage the Vietnamese module factory, Samsung Electronics will disrupt the production of the Galaxy Z Flip, which is the biggest game this year, and may cause huge losses and may be affected by the leading position in the foldable smartphone market. LG Display is also in an urgent situation. From the fourth quarter of last year, LG Display began to supply pOLED to Apple following Samsung Display, and pOLED shipments to Apple are increasing this year. As LG Display supplied pOLED to Apple, sales increased significantly last year. This year, LG Display’s Apple supply is expected to reach 15 million units.

Therefore, these two companies are desperate to manage the module factory in Vietnam to maintain the OLED business.

Molecular Glasses Receives U.S. Patent 10,593,886 For Improved OLED Device Lifetime

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The U.S. Patent Office has awarded patent number U.S. 10,593,886 to Molecular Glasses, Inc. for “OLED Devices with Improved Lifetime Using Non-Crystallizable Molecular Glass Mixture Hosts”

<Improved OLED device lifetime using OLEDIQ™, Source: molecularglasses.com>

The present invention provides an OLED multilayer electroluminescent device that includes a cathode, an anode, a light-emitting layer (LEL) disposed there between, and charge-transporting layers disposed between (A) the cathode and the light-emitting layer, (B) the anode and the light-emitting layer, or (C) both (A) and (B). The light-emitting layer (LEL) includes a host material and an emitter. The host material includes a high-entropy non-crystallizable molecular glass mixture, which includes hole-transporting capabilities, electron-transporting capabilities, or ambipolar capabilities. The ambipolar capabilities include hole-transporting capabilities and electron-transporting capabilities.

According to Mike Molaire, Molecular Glasses’ CEO and Founder, “OLEDIQ™ materials are amorphous, soluble small molecules that are non-crystallizable, which prevents aggregation of dopant emitters. This means OLEDIQ™ produces significant improvements in OLED lifetime and high reliability. This is an ideal platform for high-efficiency, long-lasting blue OLED. OLEDIQ™ materials can be used for both the vacuum-thermal deposition production process, as well as inkjet printing without any modification”.

 

The OLED emitting material market will grow to $ 1.9 billion by 2020

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UBI Research(www.ubiresearch.com), a company specializing in OLED market research, predicted that the market for OLED emitting materials for 2020 will rapidly grow to $ 1.9 billion.

According to the OLED emitting material market track published by UBI Research every quarter, the emitting material market in 2019 was $ 1.304 billion, up 39.2% from 2018’s $ 0.937 billion market.

The reason for the growth of the emitting market in 2019 is proportional to the growth of the OLED panel market for smartphones. This is because OLED shipments for smartphones in 2018 were 407 million units, but growth was 16% in 2019 at 474 million units. (Source: UBI Research 2020 OLED Display Market Track).

The reason why the emitting material market growth is greater than that of the panel market is that 6G flexible OLED factories of Chinese panel makers have started operation. The production amount is still small, but the yield is low, so the input of the substrate is twice the amount of production, so the consumption of emitting materials is very high. In addition, it is one of the reasons that the market for emitting materials has grown due to the small purchase volume compared to Samsung Display.

As a result of counting sales by emitting materials companies in 2019, UDC accounted for $ 233 million, accounting for 17.9% of total sales, and Samsung SDI accounted for $ 212 million (including Novaled sales), accounting for 16.2%.

In 2020, both panel makers’ capacity and utilization rate are expected to increase, and consumption of emitting materials is also expected to increase.

The total consumption of emitting materials in 2019 was 73 tons, but it is expected to increase to 102 tons in 2020.

Expected consumption for each material is 16.9 tons for HITL materials and 4.15 tons for blue host materials. Blue host and dopant materials are expected to increase rapidly from 2021 when Samsung Display starts mass production of QD-OLED.

Wuhan Tianma 6G OLED line installation delay

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The Tianma T4 plant in Wuhan has continued to produce even during the corona period, and the core equipment of the ph2 6G OLED line has already been brought in, but the equipment set-up is delayed due to the inability of overseas equipment companies to enter Wuhan.

In recent, as the number of corona virus spreaders in China, including Wuhan, has declined, equipment set-up is expected to resume from the second quarter, and mass production is expected to start after the third quarter.

The ph2 of Tianma T4 was signed on June 1, 2018, and a total of RMB 14.5 billion was invested. When the Ph2 setup is complete, the Tianma T4 plant will have a total of 35K Capa in 6G.

2020 OLED Manufacturing Equipment Market Forecast

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According to UBI Research’s annual equipment market track for 2020, the OLED manufacturing equipment market is expected to reach $ 9.51 billion in 2020. This is an increase of $ 1.2 billion compared to $ 8.31 billion in 2019.

Chinese panel makers have aggressively invested the 6G Flexible OLED line, but due to the high panel price, the adoption of flexible OLED produced in China in the smartphone market has not increased, leading to an oversupply of over 30% worldwide. For this reason, Korea has stopped investing in 6G flexible OLED, and Chinese panel makers are also delaying their investment time slightly.

However, by 2020, Samsung Display’s investment in the 8.5G QD-OLED 30K line began, and the equipment market will remain at the 2019 level.

Canon enters OLED materials business

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Canon is considering the OLED materials business as the adoption of OLED panels such as smartphones and TVs is spreading. OLED panels are used in electronic finders in Canon’s mirrorless cameras.

Although no specific production date has been announced, the company will focus on research and development, group companies in Fukui Prefecture, and Fukui Canon.

Canon Tokki, the No. 1 OLED evaporator market share, is a subsidiary.

Canon is developing TADF luminescent materials as Cu-complex compounds. (Japanese Patent JP2011213643A)

OPPO Launches All-round 5G Flagship Find X2 Series with Industry-leading Screen

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OPPO unveiled its Find X2 series March 6, 2020 – a flagship lineup of 5G devices that delivers a powerful camera experience and battery life, with one of the most advanced screens in the industry.

In the 5G era, with the improvement of the network, users are now consuming content at a much faster rate and simultaneously have higher requirements for the content quality. Catering to these needs, Find X2 is equipped with a 120Hz QHD+ AMOLED screen, an all-round ultra-vision-camera system, the industry’s fastest 65W SuperVOOC 2.0 flash charging technology and the most advanced 5G mobile platform—Snapdragon 865. The Find X2 Pro is also the first mobile phone to support all-pixel omnidirectional focus and up to 12bit photo capturing.

Both Find X2 and Find X2 Pro are equipped with an OPPO customized 120Hz 6.7inch QHD+ Ultra Vision Screen with more than one billion variations of color display capabilities, bringing a visual revolution in resolution, color, refresh rate and brightness. With a resolution of 3168×1440, 513 ppi, ultra-low screen reflectivity and a maximum screen brightness of up to 1200nit, it creates a clear and comfortable display in any environment.

The Find X2 series adopts a front and back sleek double-curve body design. The front of Find X2 series is covered with Corning Gorilla’s sixth-generation glass panel. The advanced COP packaging technology and the 67.8° curved surface design create a visually borderless effect, making the phone round and smooth to touch.

AP System supplies ELA equipment to Chongqing BOE B12

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AP System was selected as the final bidder for BOE’s B12 line ELA (eximer laser annealing) equipment.

ELA is an essential equipment to make low temperature polysilicon (LTPS) TFT for OLED. Eximer laser crystallizes a-Si into polysilicon. It is called LTPS because it makes polysilicon without applying high heat.

In this bid, BOE presented not only equipment quality but also technical competitiveness, easy operation, and maintenance as a supply condition. The AP system met all these requirements and became a final equipment supplier. The official PO has not come out yet.

BOE B12 plans to install eight ELA units. AP System also supplied ELA equipment to BOE’s B7 and B11.

The impact of the corona virus on the OLED market in 2020

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Dark clouds are approaching Korean industry by the corona virus that has been blown since the beginning of the year. Wuhan, the birthplace of the corona virus, is badly affecting the Chinese display industry because it is a key place where Chinese display makers are building large production bases.

Wuhan and other plant set-ups are experiencing difficulties due to the lack of manpower needed to build the line. At the same time, the utilization rate of the entire supply chain in China is falling sharply, as the labor force of parts and materials manufacturers in China is delayed to return to the factory. In the smartphone industry, the center of the OLED industry, iPhone production is affected in the first quarter. Foxconn’s factories, which produce iPhones in Zhangzhou and Shenzhen, China, are operating at 50% at end-February. This is because manufacturing workers are returning to the factory late. Companies such as Huawei, Xiaomi, Oppo, and Vivo are also hampering smartphone production due to delays in parts procurement.

Nevertheless, the production of OLED smartphones is not much affected yet. First, Samsung Display’s panel production plant, which accounts for 86.3% (2019) of OLED shipments for smartphones, is located in Korea, while the module plant in Vietnam is not affected by China. In addition, the supply chain has no effect as most of the material production bases that make up OLED panels (including modules) are also in Korea.

Samsung Display’s OLED production for smartphones in January and February totaled 48 million units, less than 2 million units compared to 50 million units shipped in the same period in 2019. Of these, 14 million and 17 million units were supplied to Chinese smartphone makers in 2019 and 2020, respectively. This year, more than 3 million units are shipped. So far, Samsung Display’s OLED business is not affected by the corona virus.

The total market share of Chinese OLED panel makers in 2019 is 11.7%. By February, the panel utilization rate of Chinese OLED panel makers was maintained at 80%. The impact of factory operation due to lack of manpower is about 20% because most of the display manufacturing industry is driven by automated facilities. Chinese OLED makers import most of the major materials, including light emitting materials, from Korea and Japan, so they are hardly affected by the corona virus.

The parts procurement status of smartphone makers in China affects the market. If Chinese suppliers, including Huawei, fail to procure parts in China, smartphone production will be hampered. However, as Samsung Display’s OLED production for China is progressing smoothly, Chinese smartphone makers have a strategy of maintaining OLED smartphones, which are expensive brands.

In addition, the first quarter is the off-season with the lowest shipment season, so even if it is difficult to operate a smartphone manufacturing plant until March, the impact on the overall market is about 10%. After the second quarter, if the corona virus subsides, demand can resume.

The problem is from March. China’s corona virus has slowed down, but South Korea has been expanding since the last week of February. There is someone has a virus at Samsung’s Gumi smartphone manufacturing plant. In addition, the Vietnamese authorities, concerned about the influx of South Korea’s virus, refused to visit Koreans, which may make it difficult for the headquarters to properly deal with problems with Samsung Display’s module plant management in Vietnam.

Most important of all, the corona virus is spreading all over the world, and economic activity is severely reduced. In China, the entrance of the apartment is blocked, so it is difficult to bring TV. The Chinese TV market is shrinking. Many people are refusing to go out because they are concerned about a corona virus infection, so fewer people visit a store and buy a smartphone. Consumer sentiment is falling significantly.

Assuming that the corona virus crisis will end in March in Korea and China, the impact of the smartphone OLED industry on 2020 is estimated to be about 5%, but if it is prolonged, it may be adversely affected by more than 10%. Assuming that the corona virus crisis will end in March, the impact of the smartphone OLED industry on 2020 is estimated to be around 5%, but if it continues until the first half of the year, it could be adversely affected by 10%.

The OLED business for TV is slightly different. LG Display’s factories that produce exclusive OLED panels for TVs are located in Paju, Korea, and Guangzhou, China. The Paju plant is not disrupted at all. Like OLEDs for smartphones, parts and components are mostly supplied by Korean and Japanese companies, so Paju factory is not affected by China.

The problem is the Guangzhou plant. LG Display has been expected to produce panels since September 2019, but its supply has been delayed due to poor panel lifetime. LG Display has begun production of panels again this year and is undergoing product tests from customers. Recently, however, the corona virus has begun to spread in Korea, making it difficult for Korean engineers to go to Guangzhou. Even if the corona virus disappears in the first quarter in China and the factories operate normally, it may take some time before the panel is supplied from the Guangzhou plant.

According to Ubi Research’s OLED market track, the 2020 forecast is 4.95 million units without considering the corona virus situation, of which 750,000 OLED panels for TV can be produced by LG Display in the first quarter. If the 55-inch production volume is large, up to 800,000 units can be produced. Since the data were prepared in anticipation that panels produced at the GuangZhou plant will be available from the second quarter, LG Display’s panel supply is expected to be 1.4 million units in the second quarter.

However, it is possible that production will be delayed after May if the customer’s quality certification of panels produced at Guangzhou plant is delayed due to the Korean coronavirus rather than the Chinese coronavirus. In that case, the annual TV panel production could be reduced by about 200,000 units, which is expected to decrease by 4% from the estimated total. However, if the corona virus is prolonged by June, it can cause up to 10% of adverse effects. The market should consider 500,000 fewer than expected.

Galaxy S20 series, Korea’s first day of opening about 70,000 units

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The opening volume of Samsung’s new smartphone Galaxy S20 series on the first day in Korea is half that of last year’s Galaxy S10.

According to the Korean telecommunications industry on February 28, the opening volume of the Galaxy S20 series is estimated at about 70,800 units. This figure is about 50% lower than the 140,000 units of the Galaxy S10, which was released in March last year.

In the industry, the Galaxy S20 Ultra is equipped with an 108 million pixel camera, so it was expected that the S20 series, which greatly enhanced the camera function, will be in high demand.

The decrease in the opening volume of the Galaxy S20 is estimated to have reduced demand for the Galaxy S20 due to the decrease in offline visitors due to the spread of the new corona virus.

LG Display named Huawei flexible OLED supplier for new smartphone P40 Pro

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LG Display is the top OLED company with a monopoly market in the production of OLED panels for TVs, but the performance was low in the flexible OLED market for smartphones until the first half of 2019.

LG Display built a flexible OLED line after Samsung Display and focused on panel sales, but failed to supply flexible OLED by pushing BOE to Huawei’s P30 Pro model in 2019. However, in the second half of 2019, it succeeded in supplying panels to Huawei for Mate30 Pro, and began supplying flexible OLED for iPhone to Apple.

Huawei’s P40 Pro shipment target is 12 million units, and LG Display is expected to supply 50%. The variable is a new coronavirus. It could change Huawei’s smartphone launch schedule and volume.

Huawei is highly dependent on domestic demand, and coronaviruses can reduce shipments by more than 10%.

Compal develops 13-inch foldable PC FlexBook

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Compal, an ODM for notebook and mobile devices, has developed a prototype foldable hybrid tablet that can be equipped with a keyboard. Similar to Lenovo’s ThinkPad X1 Fold, Compal’s FlexBook is a 13.1 tablet with two speakers at the bottom, two USB-C ports, and a volume button on the side.

The tablet can be folded in half with a foldable OLED and a zero gap lay flat hinge. Fold in half to use it like a notebook. Attach a keyboard to make it easier to use. This product can use stylus.

IPhone shipments may drop sharply in 1Q

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The impact of China’s corona virus is expected to reduce iPhone production by 50% year-on-year.

Foxconn’s iPhone plants are located in Zhangzhou and Shenzhen, China, where 90% of the iPhone is manufactured.

Foxconn’s Zhangzhou’s workforce is about 160,000, but only about 10% have returned since the spring holiday, and the Shenzhen plant has not resumed production.

Foxonn plans to increase overall utilization by 80% in March. For the time being, iPhone production is expected to decline.

Foxconn pays 3000 yuan (about $ 400) per person if it returns before March 7th to increase plant utilization.

Estimated OLED shipments by 2020 will be 662 million units

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According to UBI Research’s “2020 OLED Annual Report”, OLED sales in 2020 are expected to be $ 38.5 billion, an increase of 17.5% from the sales of $ 32.8 billion in 2019.

In terms of shipments in 2020, smartphone OLEDs are expected to reach 527 million units, TV OLED units at 4.9 million units, and watch OLED units at 118 million units. The estimated 2020 shipments of OLED for foldable phones are 6 million units.

The bad news for the OLED market for smartphones in 2020 is a decline in demand due to the ongoing Corona virus COVID-19. But in 2H, demand for flexible OLED will increase as Apple adopts more OLEDs. In particular, OCTA will be applied to the flexible OLED for iPhone, which will be produced in 2H, and the price of flexible OLED is expected to fall by 15-20%. The high price of US $ 1,000 or more could lead to a surge in replacement demand for iPhones, which could not be replaced, leading to increased flexible OLED shipments.

The product to be noted in the OLED TV market is the newly launched 48-inch product. 48-inch OLED TV, introduced as a gaming TV at CES2020, is expected to be in high demand in Japan. Sony’s OLED TV sales are expected to increase.

Chinese panel makers are very active in producing OLEDs for watches. The watch uses a small display of 1 to 1.5 inches, but the rigid OLED price is very expensive, at about $ 10 to 15 dollars. Chinese panel makers account for 43.3% of the 70 million OLED panel shipments in 2019. However, Korean companies that supply expensive flexible OLEDs to Samsung Electronics and Apple account for 65.3% of sales.

 

Foldable Phone Cover Window Material Competition To Heat up.

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Ahead of Samsung Electronics’ unpacking event, interest in the foldable phone cover window material is hot. There was a concerned surprise that the Galaxy Fold, which was scheduled to be released in the first half of last year, was delayed for several months due to the tearing issue of the protective film. This year’s concern is whether Ultrathin Glass (UTG), which has emerged as a substitute for Colorless Polyimide (CPI), can be mass-produced without major issues.

Samsung Electronics will release the Galaxy Z flip known as “Clamshell” in the first half of this year and the Galaxy Fold 2 known as “Winner 2” in the second half of this year. The Clamshell is known to adopt UTG. This material is advantageous in terms of the hardness required for the use of the S Pen, the luxurious visibility and the soft touch unique to the glass. Moreover, the major reason for adopting UTG is known to remove wrinkle at the center of the screen, which has been pointed out as a disadvantage of CPI.

Prior to adopting UTG, Samsung Display invested $ 40.8M in Dowooinsys, UTG maker, and became the largest shareholder with 27.7% stake. The intention is to secure the stable supply of UTG and reduce its dependence on Japan for major materials.

<Ultrathin Glass (UTG) (Source : Dowooinsys homepage)>

However, there are also concerns about the adoption of UTG. Schott, AGC and Corning are also developing the product and they can produce substrates with a thickness of about 100 mm by the floating method or the slit nozzle method. To make it even thinner, Dowooinsys uses hot drawing or HF etching. The thickness of UTG to secure durability is believed to be 100 mm or more and with this thickness, the radius of curvature is about 2 ~ 3mm (~1mm for CPI), which reduces design freedom of the foldable phones. To improve durability, the UTG surface is coated with a polymer resin, which also prevents glass fragments from scattering when broken. The current problems of UTG are that mass production and yield are not yet secured due to the difficulty of the process, and that there exist traumatic worries on unexpected durability issues when released to the market.

Meanwhile, CPI material companies, which have been threatened by the news that UTG will be adopted for Clamshell, are also preparing to fight back. In order to remove the changeable window film (protective film) of PET material applied to Galaxy Fold, they are increasing the hardness of the hard coating on the CPI and developing a functional coating to give a glassy gloss. In particular, Dongwoo Fine-Chem, which did hard-coating on the CPI for Galaxy Fold, is known to simplify the process by developing hard coating materials including antifouling function. With all efforts added up , the CPI cover window structure is changed from the first generation foldable phone (PET + COA + CPI + COA) to the second generation foldable phone (CPI + COA), enabling the thickness to be reduced from about 200 mm to half, and the material cost and the process to be reduced.

<2019 Released Samsung Galaxy Fold Structure (Source: UBI Research Report)>

<Structure Prediction of the Samsung Galaxy Fold Follow-up Models: When Using UTG (Left) and CPI (Right) (Source: UBI Research)>

In addition to Sumitomo Chemical, which supplied to Galaxy Fold, Kolon Industries and SKC are also preparing for mass production of CPI. While UTG adoption seems to benefit to Clamshell with small screens, CPI is advantageous for larger screen sizes. UTG must make up for durability at the thickness retaining design freedom, and secure mass production system and price competitiveness through process improvement. CPI should strive to improve the hardness and appearance close to glass, and also increase price competitiveness. The material selection criteria will vary with the foldable phone models and customer response. Therefore the customer response for the Clamshell will be an important step in the future direction of the foldable phone cover window material. The market for the material is expected to grow rapidly, reaching $ 429.6M by 2023. The competition between UTG and CPI to take the market first has now begun.

JDI at Japan signed a $1 billion investment contract and focused on automobile LCDs and finger sensors rather than OLEDs.

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Japan Display (JDI) announced on the Jan. 31st that they have signed a final contract to receive investment of up to 108 billion yen (980 million dollar) from Ichigo Asset Management. Therefore, the company is expected to release its debts and invest in new fields such as fingerprint sensors. However, it has yet to be determined whether JDI will invest in OLED for Smartphones.

It will take over preferred shares at 50.4 billion yen and secure 44 percent of voting rights to become the largest shareholder. The remaining 50.4 billion yen will take over preferred shares that do not have voting rights, but after one year, it will be possible to convert ordinary shares, which will result in more than a majority of Ichigo’s voting rights. Scott Caron, the CEO of Ichigo, will be Chairman of JDI after approval. JDI plans to hold an extraordinary shareholders’ meeting on March 25 to get the official approval and receive the funds on March 26 the same day.

JDI is supplying liquid crystal panels for the iPhone to Apple, but JDI needs a new revenue source as Apple is set to hire more OLED panels in the mid- and long-term. JDI plans to use funds from Ichiro to invest in facilities such as LCDs for automobile and fingerprint sensors. In an interview in September 19, JDI’s CEO Kikuoka said, “We will decide whether or not to mass-produce OLED panels for smartphones in 2020,” but this investment is not expected to be easy.

<JDI president Kikuoka (left) and Ichigo CEO Scott Caron (Nikkei.com)>

Motorola unveils clamshell-type foldable OLED smartphone

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Reporter : Daejeong Yoon

Motorola unveiled “ Moto RAZR 2019 ”, a clamshell type foldable OLED smartphone at a presentation to be held in Los Angeles, USA on November 13th. The Motorola RAZR is characterized by the folding in the horizontal direction rather than the vertical folding like a book, and is like the new foldable phone type that Samsung Electronics unveiled at SDC 2019 last October.

<Moto RAZR 2019, Source: gsmarena.com>

Moto RAZR 2019 will be equipped with a 6.2-inch OLED and the vendor will be BOE. OLEDs are notched, with an aspect ratio of 22: 9 and a resolution of 2142 x 876. In addition, the external LCD is equipped with a 2.7-inch, 600 x 800 resolution secondary LCD to provide simple information such as reminders and time.

Moto RAZR 2019 will be equipped with three cameras, with 4GB / 6GB RAM, 128GB of storage, 2730mAh and an operating system of Android.

Moto RAZR 2019 is expected to cost USD 1,500 and is expected to be officially released in December.

Rigid OLEDs dominate shipments of the OLED market for smartphones

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Reporter : Daejeong Yoon

According to UBI Research’s 4th quarter OLED display market track, rigid OLED is still the main product in the OLED market for smartphones, with 79.2% of the total OLED market in 2019. As a result of counting and analyzing shipments up to the third quarter of 2019, rigid OLED accounted for 237 million units of the total shipment of 338 million units.

<Source: UBI Research Q4 OLED Market Track>

Display companies all over the world have invested heavily in the flexible OLED line, but rigid OLED is still the main OLED used in smartphones. This reflects that the display companies have invested without forecasting the market situation properly.

Rigid OLEDs for smartphones are mostly supplied by Samsung Display. Rigid OLEDs are also produced in China’s Visionox and EDO, but are not yet available to brand companies. As the A1 and A2 lines, which produce rigid OLEDs at Samsung Display, are both in full operation, Samsung Display can no longer supply products in the growing rigid OLED market.

Flexible OLED lines will continue to be invested by 2023, and the annual production area will increase to 20 million square meters per year, but the line capa for rigid OLEDs has been frozen since 7 million square meters per year.

<Source: UBI Research Q4 OLED Market Track>

Therefore, in order to cope with the growing rigid OLED market, it is necessary to convert flexible lines to rigid OLED lines or to further invest in rigid OLED lines.

In order for Samsung Display to dominate and have a differentiated market in the display industry, it is time for latecomers to consider converting flexible OLED lines to rigid OLED lines.

The next full-screen display trend is the under-display camera

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Reporter : Daejeong Yoon

Since Samsung’s Galaxy S8 and Apple’s iPhone X launch, smartphones with the Home button removed have become a trend in the smartphone market.

Due to the nature of smartphones that cannot grow indefinitely, display sizes with a large proportion within limited smartphone sizes are directly related to the competitiveness of smartphone set makers.

Samsung’s Galaxy S10, which was recently released, attracted great attention with its flexible OLED with HIAA (hole in active area) technology. Notch or HIAA designs, however, can still interfere with video viewing and gaming because camera lenses occupy a small portion of the display.

That is why a number of panel makers are developing under display camera technology for a full-screen display.

Under display camera technology allows the front camera to be placed behind the display for a full-screen display. Oppo unveiled the first smartphone with the technology at MWC China 2019, and BOE and Visionox also anticipated that under-display cameras will become the next trend in smartphones at CIOC 2019.

It is expected that screen, camera module, and algorithmic technologies will all be specially designed to implement under display camera technology. Specifically, the technology to make the pixel near the camera at low resolution to secure transmittance, to mount a CMOS image sensor of a larger pixel size than the existing, and to apply algorithm technology to improve the picture quality.

The trend of full-screen smartphones, which began in 2017, is paying attention to whether full-screen smartphones will bloom with the technology of under-display cameras since 2020.

OLED flagship size for smartphones ranges from 5.5 inches to 6.5 inches

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Reporter : Daejeong Yoon

According to UBI Research’s 3rd quarter OLED display market track, the size of OLED for smartphones is gradually shifting from 5.5~5.99 inches to 6~6.49 inches.

Among the OLED shipments for smartphones of 430 million units in 2017, 5.5-5.99 inches accounted for 52.5%, but in the shipment performance until the third quarter of 2019, 5.5-5.99 inches decreased to 49.6% and 6-6.49 inches increased to 42.3%.

In 2017, more than 5.5 inches of OLED smartphones were 78.5%, but now more than 5.5 inches are 91.9%. This reflects that consumers are demanding larger OLED smartphones.

When analyzed by detailed size, 5.5-inch OLED shipments were the most at 39.5%, and second, 6.4-inch OLEDs were the highest at 20.1%. Most of the 5.5-inch are rigid OLEDs and are mainly used by Galaxy J series, Chinese companies such as Huawei, Xiaomi, Oppo and Vivo. In the 6.4 inch, the main application is the rigid OLED for the Galaxy A series.

<Source: UBI Research Q3 OLED Market Track>

Because the Galaxy S series, which adopts flexible OLED, and Apple’s iPhone X are very expensive in the global OLED smartphone market, the market growth is very slow. In comparison, the Galaxy A series and J series are growing fast because they are intended for the mid-priced smartphone market.

While Samsung’s Galaxy has lost market share in the Chinese market, Chinese smartphone makers Huawei, Xiaomi, Oppo and Vivo are expanding the Chinese market as smartphones using rigid OLEDs from Samsung Display.

This means that Samsung Electronics lost the Chinese market, but Samsung Display’s OLED business is gradually expanding its influence in the Chinese market. The growing market share of OLED smartphones in the Chinese smartphone market indicates that Samsung Display can overwhelm the OLED market in the future, and that revenues will be updated every year.

 

 

[UBI Research China Trend Report] Will BOE Provide UPC Panel with Transparent PI Substrate to Oppo?

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Reporter : Daejeong Yoon

As foldable smartphones begin to be sold by Samsung Electronics, the flexible OLED industry (including foldable OLED) is expected to continue to grow.

Yi Choonghoon, CEO of UBI Research, predicts that the flexible OLED panel market will grow to $ 18.92 billion this year and expand to $ 32.65 billion by 2023.

<Source: Flexible & Foldable OLED Report, UBI Research>

According to Yi, there are four types of flexible OLED products, including smartphones, foldable phones, watches and automobiles, and flexible OLEDs will be used in the monitor market next year. LG Electronics began to sell rollable OLED TVs, but the sales volume is so small that it will take much time to form the market. The foldable smartphones that Samsung started to sell are expected to be supplied to the market by 800,000 by the end of this year.

In addition, Yi predicted that Chinese panel companies’ flexible line production will expand very rapidly in line with the expansion of the flexible OLED market.

As of 2019, Korean display companies have an annual substrate area of 7.3 million square meters and China’s 4.6 million square meters, but by 2023, China’s production capacity will expand to 11 million square meters, accounting for 57% of the total production capacity.

China is expected to have the world’s largest facility for flexible OLED production following LCD.

<Source: Flexible & Foldable OLED Report, UBI Research>

 

OLED TV camp threw a pitch in the 65-inch TV market for Black Friday.

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On Black Friday, the day of the biggest sale season in the US, LG Electronics and Sony have lowered the price of 65-inch OLED TVs from the previous month, further increasing price competition in the premium TV market. On the other hand, 55-inch and 77-inch OLED TV prices are the same except for Sony’s XBR77A9G.

In November, LG Electronics’ OLED 65C9, a 65-inch OLED TV, was priced at US $ 2,100, down 12.5% from October’s US $ 2,400. Sony’s XBR65A8G’s November price was US $ 2,000, down 13% from the October price of US $ 2,300. Both models ship the same price at US $ 3,500.

Samsung’s QN65Q90, a 2019 QLED TV, is priced at US $ 2,200 in November, down 15.4% from the October price of US $ 2,600. The QN65Q90 also ships at US $ 3,500.

<LG Electronics’ OLED65C9, Sony’s XBR65A8G, and Samsung’s QN65Q90 price trend, Source: UBI Research DB, Bestbuy.com>

In the TV market, which is growing in size, 65-inch TVs are becoming mainstream along with 55-inch TVs. Since 55-inch OLED TVs have already formed a premium TV standard of US $ 1,500 since October, LG Electronics and Sony have continued to reduce the price of 65-inch OLED TVs, another mainstream, to compete with QLED TVs.

Since August, LG Electronics’ OLED65C9 and Sony’s XBR65A8G have formed a lower price range than Samsung’s QN65Q90, and Black Friday is also trying to get a price advantage with a price lower than QN65Q90.

LG Electronics and Sony, which are striving to popularize OLED TVs, are paying attention to whether OLED TV’s position in the premium TV market can be further expanded.

Samsung Display starts to expand OLED notebook market in Taiwan

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Samsung Display attended the Taipei Grand Maple Hotel on November 7, attended by 350 global customers including HP, Dell, Lenovo, Asus and other major ODMs such as Compal, Quanta and Wistron. ‘Samsung OLED Forum 2019 Taipei’ was held.

<Samsung Display’s OLED Forum, Source: news.samsungdisplay.com>

Samsung Display presented OLED notebooks as a new growth engine in the stagnant IT market for global IT companies and introduced differentiated strengths that only OLED can provide.

Under the theme of ‘New Era of Laptop with OLED’, Samsung Display is a premium notebook with OLED’s thin and light design flexibility, infinite contrast ratio, DCI-P3 100% wide color gamut and color accuracy, and excellent outdoor visibility. Emphasis is placed on the essential image quality characteristics.

In addition, the company also unveiled a roadmap for fusion technology of OLED’s unique display sensors such as Fingerprint Display and Sound Display.

Samsung Display has already developed OLED for 13.3-inch and 15.6-inch notebooks in the first half of this year and has cooperated with HP, Dell, Lenovo, and Asus to supply panels to 13 kinds of notebooks. The company plans to expand its product lineup to mid-end and respond to market demand.

<15.6-inch multi-screen OLED notebook exhibited by Samsung display at IMID 2019>

Samsung Display decided to invest 13 trillion won in QD-OLED by 2025

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Samsung Display chose QD-OLED as the next generation premium TV. It will also have a big impact on the premium TV market, which is divided between white OLED technology and QLED technology.

Samsung Display announced a new investment and win-win cooperation agreement ceremony at Asan Campus on October 10 and will invest a total of KRW 13 trillion in QD-OLED production facilities and R & D by 2025.

The basic structure of QD-OLED is composed of blue OLED and red and green quantum dot color filters (QD-CF). Blue OLEDs emit blue light, and the red and green QD-CFs convert them to red and green, respectively. QD is also applied to QLEDs because it has the effect of further improving color purity.

Samsung Display will invest 13 trillion won by 2025 to build the world’s first QD display mass production line ‘Q1 Line’ at Asan Campus. The new line will start production in full scale in 2021 with an initial 30,000 sheets (8.5 generations) and will produce a 65-inch or larger ultra-large QD display. To this end, the company plans to convert existing 8G LCD lines into QD OLED lines step by step and gradually expand production capacity by 2025.

In addition, in order to accelerate the commercialization of new QD technology, the company plans to shift the existing LCD workforce to QD and hire new QD materials and process development experts. Samsung Display predicted that if investments start in earnest, approximately 81,000 jobs will be created over the next five years.

Lee Dong-hoon, president of Samsung Display, emphasized that “QD, a semiconductor particle that emits light close to natural colors, is the future growth vision of the large display industry.” “We will lead the premium display market with this investment.”

LG Display Announces Q3 2019 Results, Revenue 5,817.2 Billion won, Operating Loss 436.7 Billion won

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LG Display announced on the 23rd that it recorded sales of 5,827.1 billion won and operating loss of 436.7 billion won in the third quarter of 2019 according to K-IFRS.

Revenue increased 9% QoQ (5.35 trillion won) due to the full-fledged sales of plastic OLED business and the expansion of mobile panel sales.

On the other hand, 3Q operating loss fell last quarter due to a sharp drop in LCD TV panel prices that exceeded market expectations, reduced utilization of related fabs, and increased depreciation expenses associated with the operation of new plastic OLED plants. The operating loss recorded 436.7 billion won.

Net loss was 442.2 billion won and EBITDA was 611.8 billion won (EBITDA margin of 10.5%).

Revenue breakdown in the third quarter of 2019 recorded 32%, a 9% QoQ decline for TV panels due to a decline in shipments due to adjustments in LCD TV fab utilization. Mobile panels recorded 28%, up 9% p QoQ, due to full-scale production of plastic OLED panels. Notebook and tablet panels accounted for 21 percent and monitor panels 18 percent.

Dong-hee Seo, Executive Vice President of LG Display CFO, said, “LG Display is innovating its business structure to reinforce its fundamental competitiveness and have a differentiated competitive edge.” In addition, the company plans to find ways to secure competitiveness from a more fundamental and long-term perspective, while at the same time strengthening its IT, commercial (auto) and auto (business) business capabilities that can differentiate in the existing LCD sector. Large OLEDs will accelerate the market trend utilizing the inherent value of products and continue to stabilize the business of plastic OLEDs for smartphones. ”

In addition, “We will communicate with the market by establishing a long-term vision centering on technologies and product lines that can quickly complete the ongoing LCD structure improvement activities and provide differentiated value.”

[SID Vehicle Display 2019] OLED is optimal for side mirror replacement display

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In October 2018, Samsung Display received a lot of attention by supplying OLED for side mirror replacement to e-Tron of Audi, a global automaker. e-Tron has a camera installed in the side of the existing side mirror, and the driver can check the surroundings through the OLED installed in the vehicle.

Mirrorless cars were discussed at the SID Vehicle Display 2019 panel discussion in September 2019.

Drew Harbach pointed out that “existing side mirrors may have the effect of glare in tunnel-like spaces.” “The cameras and displays can be reduced to provide a better night view.”

He mentioned that the resolution of the display is important, of course, but the contrast and FOV are also very important factors. He also emphasized that the contrast ratio should be very high so that objects can be seen under any environmental conditions.

The high contrast ratio is a very helpful factor in recognizing objects not only in dark nights but also under the strong sunlight of the day.

Panelists mentioned the various displays such as LCD, OLED, micro LED, etc., but OLED is the only display with high contrast ratio and wide viewing angle in the environment where mass production is possible. In addition, OLED has a very fast response time, which is widely used in VR devices and professional monitors where image quality is very important.

OLEDs are mentioned as potential candidates for side-mirror displays and are expected to be used in internal displays, such as clusters and CIDs (center information displays). Korean and Chinese panel makers are actively developing automotive OLEDs, and Samsung Display has forecast that automotive OLED panels will increase to about 3 million by 2022.

Second quarter OLED emitting materials market grew 41.1% compared to the same quarter last year

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According to the OLED emitting material market track published by UBI Research (www.ubiresearch.com), the second quarter earnings was $ 329 million, an increase of 16.6% compared with the previous quarter’s $ 228 million, and 41.1% higher than the second quarter’s $ 233 million.

<Source: 3Q2019 UBI Research OLED Emitting Material Market Track>

As a light emitting materials company with high sales in the second quarter, UDC accounted for 22.7% of the total market with US $ 72.7 million, with Idemitsu Kosan 12%, Merck, Dow Chemical, and Novaled more than 10%. None of the Korean emitting material companies exceeded 10% market share.

UDC’s strongest sales were due to the 6-month-long purchase of dopant material from the BOE, which anticipates it will be difficult to purchase phosphorescent dopant materials in the US-China trade dispute. The phosphorescent red host, phosphorescent green host, and p + materials all exceeded $ 30 million.

According to the analysis of the material usage, the total material usage of the second quarter was 21.3 tons, 21% more than the previous quarter, and 49% higher than the same quarter last year. The high usage of materials compared to the amount is interpreted as a result of a slight decrease in prices as Chinese panel makers use more materials.

OLED sales increased to $ 6.9 billion in the second quarter

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According to the OLED market track published by UBI Research in the third quarter, OLED sales increased to $ 6.9 billion in the second quarter. This is an increase of 9.5% compared to last quarter, an increase of 18.5% from the same quarter last year.

The biggest reason for the increase in sales is the increase in OLED sales to China by Samsung Display, which leads the OLED industry. Huawei, Oppo, Vivo, and Xiomi’s OLED usage increased more than 1.5 times compared to last year, and Samsung Display’s sales in the second quarter were $ 5.5 billion. In addition, LG Display’s WRGB OLED sales growth and BOE’s flexible OLED sales boosted the market to $ 6.9 billion.

Samsung Display’s sales share accounted for 79.9% and BOE’s market share increased to 6%.

<Source: 3Q2019 UBI Research OLED Market Track>

In 3Q, sales are expected to increase further. Samsung Display’s flexible OLED shipments will increase further for Apple’s new models and Huawei’s Mate. LG Display will also begin supplying flexible OLEDs to Apple, and BOE has decided to supply flexible OLEDs to LG Electronics.

Samsung and LG fight for 8K TV picture quality

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In response to 8K LCD TV quality disputes that LG Electronics compared and exhibited at IFA2019, Samsung Electronics raised the problem of burning of OLED TVs.

At the exhibition hall, LG Electronics displayed the same screen on its NanoCell 8K LCD TV and other companies’ 8K LCD TVs, and magnified images taken by precision cameras on the same screen area, allowing 90% reproduction of CM (contrast modulation) of NanoCell TV. However, it emphasized that other companies’ 8K LCD TV is only 12%. The company did not say what kind of company it was, but LG was recently emphasized that LG Electronics disassembled Samsung’s QLED TV after IFA and talked that QD-LCD using QD sheet does not produce good image quality. Thus the other 8K can be estimated as SEC’s QLED TV.

In response, Samsung Electronics publicly reported to the press that 8K OLED TVs disappear due to image sticking.

There is a very confusing dispute for consumers who do not have expertise in picture quality. Putting the two companies together, Samsung’s 8K QLED TV and OLED TV are both less qualified products.

In reality, however, the two products seen by the IFA were among the best of all existing TVs. OLED TVs have very high contrast ratios, so even in two-dimensional flat screens, the perspective is displayed as well as three-dimensional TVs. QLED TVs have very high HDR, which are delicately expressed from bright to dark screens. Also, the two products must be TVs with the highest precision at 8K resolution.

Korean media have expressed a lot of negative views about noise marketing of Samsung and LG, but it seems that the two companies’ TVs have been developed.

In fact, when Apple criticized the Galaxy for its low resolution, Samsung Electronics has grown to the world’s best product by raising the resolution of OLED to QHD level. In addition, Samsung Electronics made a negative offensive by pointing to the burning of OLED TVs, but OLED TVs expanded the market to nearly 50% of the premium TV market of more than $ 2,000. Of course, most of the burning has been eliminated.

Therefore, Samsung Electronics is also expected to be an opportunity to grow 8K QLED TV’s image quality into the world’s best LCD TV.

The two companies have a negative fight because of their own grievances. If OLED TV market share continues to rise in the premium TV market, Samsung Electronics expressed a sense of crisis as the QLED TV market shrank by that much. If 8K QLED TVs lower prices and target the premium TV market, LG Electronics should prevent the expansion of the QLED TV market in order to accelerate the growth of the OLED TV market.

In a strategy battle in which the spear and shield alternate, the TV fight of the two companies will be a good opportunity for Korean TV to maintain the world’s best level.

Fraunhofer FEP shows modular OLED light strips

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Almost everyone is familiar with light strips for interior design. LED strips are available by the metre in DIY stores around the corner and are just as often found as under-cabinet luminaires or in decorative articles. But also in the automotive industry the demand for light strips is enormous. Customized strips with additional functionalities play an increasingly important role, especially in the area of innovative car designs.

Scientists at the Fraunhofer FEP have now succeeded in producing light strips from individual organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). What is special about this innovation is that the OLED light strips act like a single luminous surface without interruption.

Claudia Keibler-Willner, head of the “Sheet-to-sheet OLED Technologies” department at Fraunhofer FEP, explains this effect in more detail: “We manufacture flexible OLEDs with appropriate control electronics in such a way that any number of OLED modules can be connected without creating visible interruptions to the active surface. This makes it possible to produce infinitely long OLED light strips. An additional highlight is the individual control of the segments. This allows additional lighting effects such as different dimmings or dynamic warnings to be realized.”

But why actually use OLEDs for car interiors or luminous clothing instead of using existing LED technology? The enormous advantage of OLEDs lies in their properties as area light sources. In contrast to LEDs as point light sources, OLEDs illuminate surfaces and are therefore homogeneous. As a result, OLED strips require no reflectors, light guides or additional optics. They also impress with their extremely low installation depth and light weight. This filigree quality of flexible OLEDs, which are manufactured on plastic substrates, for example, can hardly be achieved with conventional LED technology. In addition, the reduction of glare effects contributes to increased road safety, for example in safety clothing with lighting.

The OLED can make particularly good use of these advantages in the developed modular light strips of any length: OLED strips can be flexibly applied to curved surfaces such as car bodies or furniture. They can be transparent when switched off so that the underlying surface remains visible. Thus the OLEDs almost melt into their surroundings. Dynamic control or dimming opens up additional possibilities, such as for welcoming scenarios at the car. Designer dreams for interior design are thus within reach.

The scientists are now looking forward to concrete industry inquiries to develop prototypes or small series of these light strips for innovative designs and applications.

[China OLED Trends] Will US-China Trade Dispute Accelerate Chinese Large-Size OLED Market?

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Recently, due to the trade dispute between the US and China, a large portion of the budget planned by the Chinese government is flowing into the display industry while the semiconductor industry, which is one of intensive investment promotion industries, foreshadows difficulties. In the display industry, the focus is on OLED, which is a cutting-edge technology, and most of the investment is in the 6G line, a mobile product production line. This year has already been made at Visionox and Tianma on the 6G line, and BOE and CSOT will be invested further this year.

The Chinese government is actively investing in the display sector, which is relatively uncontained due to trade disputes between the United States and China, and it is reported that the mobile OLED production line as well as the large OLED line, 8.5G and 10.5G lines, are being reviewed ahead of time.

Large OLED lines are currently being mass-produced only by LG Display, and are being produced using oxide TFT and white OLED deposition. Samsung Display is also considering mass production by adding QD structures to oxide TFT and blue-based OLED deposition.

Samsung and LG are preparing to mass-produce or mass-produce by applying heat deposition method to organic materials, but Chinese OLED panel makers are oriented to mass production line of RGB Inkjet method (Solution Process OLED). However, as the investment has accelerated recently, experts are concerned about the investment of RGB inkjet method which has not been mass-proven.

This is because LG Display’s white OLED deposition method has already been mass-proven and Samsung Display is also planning to invest in the same deposition method with only the different structure. Indeed, it is necessary to see whether Chinese OLED panel makers will move beyond the second-place strategy to adopt the RGB Inkjet method or change their direction to the deposition method, a proven technology.

[IFA2019] Sony’s OLED TV Evolving from Year to Year

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Sony, which is driving the OLED TV market with LG Electronics, is exhibiting OLED TVs with new features at CES and IFA after the first display of OLED TVs.

The OLED TV displayed at Sony’s booth, which was first opened on Media Day of IFA2019, did not show a woofer. Using surface acoustic technology to produce sound from the screen, Sony showcased the CES2019’s model with four actuators on the back of the OLED panel and a woofer speaker as the rear stand. However, the woofers disappeared in IFA2019.

According to exhibition officials, the secret is that the panel is arranged with six actuators, three rows of two behind the panel, so that sound can be displayed on the screen from low to high.

2019 Solution Process OLED Annual Report

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Solution process using inkjet OLED (sol OLED) has been developed mainly as a large OLED panel for TV, but recently began to attract attention in the monitor display market.

The evaporation method with FMM that produces OLED for smartphones has a bending phenomenon of FMM. Thus, the substrate is used by dividing into two or four. Since smartphone-sized FMMs are used by attaching 10 to 15 sheets to the mask frame, the profitability is very low due to the small number of cells in the production of 20-inch or larger monitors.

In comparison, sol OLED is a highly productive method because OLED can be manufactured from the original substrate regardless of substrate size and display size.

If the 27-inch and 32-inch OLED panels, which are mainly used as gaming monitors, are produced by the FMM method, four can be produced. But sol OLEDs do not divide the substrate, so the 27-inch can make eight, and the 32-inch can make six.

Therefore, in the future, OLED manufacturing technology is expected to be used in combination of three technologies depending on the application and size. Smartphone OLEDs are expected to be divided into FMM and evaporation methods, large OLED panel manufacturing for TVs with open mask and evaporation technology, and sol OLED technology for monitors larger than 25 inches.

There are three types of premium monitor market, LCD, RGB OLED, and sol OLED, but the premium OLED monitor market will be replaced by sol OLED. If 6G-class inkjet lines are invested in large quantities, sol OLED will become the flagship product in the mid-priced monitor market.

The solution process OLED annual report, published by UBI Research (www.ubiresearch.com), expects to create a market of $ 579 million by 2023. This amount represents 85.3% of the OLED monitor market by 2023.

[Press Release] Opening Ceremony of new Novaled Headquarters(Dresden, Germany, June 2019)

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Investment of 30 million Euros in Novaled Headquarters with state-of-the-art R & D center for OLED cutting-edge technology in Dresden, Germany

After 2 years of construction Novaled GmbH opened its new headquarters in Dresden on June, 12th together with long-standing business partners and supporters. Besides representatives of Samsung SDI, the Prime Minister of Saxony, Michael Kretschmer, and the First Mayor of the city of Dresden, Dirk Hilbert, participated in the event.

Core of the 10,200 m² premises in the northern part of the city is a 110 m long R & D center with chemistry laboratories as well as cleanrooms of class ISO5 and ISO7 equipped at highest standards. The new location is an improvement all along the line. Additional space in cleanrooms allowed for investments in cluster tools. This increased the OLED processing capacity by around 40%. The generously planned chemistry laboratories with state-of-the-art equipment and proprietary analytics are a true quantum leap in the development of new materials for high-performance OLEDs.

Novaled is currently the only supplier of organic dopants for OLED display mass production in the industry. Know-how and materials from Dresden enhance therefore most high end smartphones, TVs and smart watches, equipped with OLED displays.

“State-of-the-art cleanrooms, three times more lab space and entirely new facilities offer the best conditions for innovation,” said Novaled CEO Gerd Günther. The company started back in 2003 with five key patents concerning organic electronics. Meanwhile there are nearly 1,000 Novaled patents granted or pending. “Our technologies and materials are established as an industry standard in the OLED display field,” said Gerd Günther. “Novaleds revenues clearly show that we are growing even stronger than the market.”

In addition to the construction of a new technical center, the former mill of the army bakery was extensively renovated and Novaled employees get to work there in loft-like, bright offices. A green outdoor area offers an attractive environment for meetings and relaxation. During the opening ceremony, a birch tree was planted by Novaled CEO Gerd Günther, Samsung SDI Executive Vice President Dr. Hyuk Chang , the Prime Minister of Saxony, Michael Kretschmer and the First Mayor of Dresden, Dirk Hilbert and. “The birch is a known symbol for light and a new beginning, representing what we do in our new premises,” explained Gerd Günther.

About Novaled

Novaled GmbH is a leader in the research, development and commercialization of technologies and materials that enhance the performance of OLEDs (organic light-emitting diodes) and other organic electronics. Novaled offers OLED product manufacturers a unique combination of proprietary technology, materials and expertise, and is currently the only company in the OLED industry licensing and selling organic conductivity doping technology and materials for use in the commercial mass production of display products. Novaled has developed strategic partnerships with key OLED innovators and producers throughout the world and, with a broad portfolio of more than 980 patents granted or pending, has a strong IP position in OLED technologies, structures and materials. Novaled is headquartered in Dresden with some 135 staff and offices in Asia. Since end of 2013 Novaled belongs to Samsung. www.novaled.com

 

About OLEDs

OLEDs (organic light-emitting diodes) are solid-state devices composed of multiple thin layers of organic materials often only a few nanometers thick that emit diffuse light when electricity is applied to them. Because they are an area light source, OLEDs are a key part of fulfilling the dream of the rapidly growing flat panel display market: paper-thin, highly-efficient displays with brilliant colors and excellent design flexibility. OLEDs may also lead to innovative decorative lighting applications and personalized environments. www.novaled.com/oleds/

 

[Press Release] OLED production capacity will increase to double in 2023.

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UBI Research has published [2019 OLED Equipment Report] that forecasts the OLED equipment market. According to the report, the total substrate area of display companies in 2019 will be 34.9 million square meters, which will be 68.5 million square meters in 2023 and double after four years.

OLED substrate area growth is attributable to investments made by OLED lines for TVs driven by Samsung Display and LG Display. Currently, OLED manufacturing lines for TVs are 8G lines optimized for 55-inch panel production. However, the demand for premium TVs is shifting from 55-inch OLED TVs to 65-inch TVs. By 2021, the 65-inch OLED TV market will account for more than 40%. In response to these market conditions, LG Display is preparing to invest 10.5G lines in the most efficient production of 65-inch panels. In 2023, the substrate area of a large OLED line is expected to occupy 42% of the total substrate area.

<OLED production capacity by generation>

The substrate area of the 6G line is expected to grow to 13 million square meters this year and to 19.3 million square meters in 2023. Most of this is due to investment by Chinese panel makers. In China, the smartphone market accounts for about 40% of the global market, so Chinese smartphone makers have a very high market share based on the domestic market. Huawei has recently become the world’s second-largest shipper based on its domestic market. Chinese panel makers are boldly adding a 6G flexible OLED line to Chinese smartphone makers, with the Chinese government’s huge support.

<OLED production capacity by country>

In 2019, Korea’s OLED production capacity (substrate area) will total 27.9 million square meters, accounting for 80% of its total production capacity and expanding to 54.8 million square meters by 2023. The market share will remain at 80% and lead the OLED industry.

Chinese panel makers are expected to stay at around 20% as they are investing only in OLED production lines for mobile device.

The OLED manufacturing equipment market (excluding logistics equipment) is estimated at $ 28.4 billion for four years from 2019 to 2022 due to investment by Korean and Chinese panel makers. Among them, the sixth-generation equipment market is expected to account for 61% of the total equipment market, at $ 17.2 billion.

<Equipment Market Forecast by Generation (2019 ~ 2022)>