The global display market, consisting of flat-panel, projection, and CRT products, is estimated at $104.3 billion in 2007, up 8% from $96.5 billion in 2006. (Fig. 1.) Over 95% of display production is in Asia. Outside Asia there is some CRT production. Also some companies especially in Europe are engaged in display value-added services. But the revenues from these are small, with CRT revenue diminishing rapidly as this segment awaits its extinction.
The growth is being driven by TFTLCD, which in 2007 is estimated to constitute 75% of the display market.
Almost the entire LCD production is in Asia with Taiwan, Korea, Japan, and China in the lead.
In the small- and medium-size LCD panel (displays smaller than 10 inches diagonally) market, Japan is the leading supplier. Sharp is the market leader, with 15% share in 2006, followed by TMD and Epson with 12% share each. (Fig. 2.) iSuppli notes that these companies lost their market share compared to 2005 because of the growth of Samsung and LPL, and various Taiwan companies.
Active Matrix LCDs accounted for 88% of the small- and medium-display market revenue. (Fig. 3.) Currently 55 TFT-LCD fabs exist for this segment, of which 23 are in Japan.
Many companies are focusing on LTPS TFT-LCD for small-size panels. TMD, Sharp, and TPO are investing heavily in this technology. In Korea, Samsung and LG Philips LCD produce small volumes of small-size panels, but are becoming more aggressive.
Large-size LCD panels (display size equal to or more than 10 inches diagonally) are estimated to grow to more than 350 million units in 2007, up 24% from 281.4 million units in 2006. Taiwan and Korea dominate this segment. (Table 1.) While Asia dominates LCD production, Europe and North America are the main markets. (Table 2.) Frost & Sullivan observes that with capital investment costs constantly rising, panel makers are finding it difficult to operate individually, paving the way for increased number of partnerships. Vertically integrated participants are best positioned to ride the wave of these changes, while smaller companies are in peril. Price attrition is posing a great challenge. While panel makers make huge investments in upgrading fabs, persistent decline in prices is cutting into profitability.
PDP Almost the entire global plasma display production comes from Asia from Korean, Japanese, and Taiwan companies. (Fig. 4.) In 2006, PDP shipments totaled 10 million units, generating $7.7 billion revenue.
In 2007, production is estimated at 13 million units. However, because of ASP decline, iSuppli projects only a slight increase in revenue. In Q1 07, of the top five major panel makers, the top three accounted for 80% panel production. Korean makers Samsung and LG Electronics contributed 51% of global plasma unit shipments. (Fig. 5.)
Asia-Pacific will continue to be the dominant PDP producer in spite of some production moving to Mexico to meet the high demand in the American TV market, and also to East European countries, as OEMs shift their manufacturing from CRTs to flat panels.
The plasma industry manufactures 90% of its panels for large-size display markets. The rising demand for 40-49 inch TV sets is creating more demand for PDPs. However, PDP is facing rising competition from LCD in both price and performance at the lower end of its range, and makers are shifting production to larger sizes, though currently 42-inch panel dominates panel production, accounting for 42% of total shipments in Q1 07. The majority of new fabs will produce 50-inch panels economically. ISuppli estimates that 50-inch market will exceed 1.6 million units by Q4 07, or 42% of the market.
The US dominates PDP consumption in consumer markets, followed by Europe and Japan.
OLED OLED is the next-generation technology for electronics display and lighting. Korea, Taiwan, and Japan produce over 90% of OLEDs. DisplaySearch reports that in Q2 07 OLED shipments were 19.8 million, up 24% Y/Y, and revenues were $123.4 million, up 13% Y/Y. The top five makers had a market share of 88.9%. (Table 3.) The major Taiwan maker Univision, which had shut down due to financial problems, has restarted production, and has shipped 900,000 units in Q1 07.
iSuppli estimates a 2007 revenue of OLED market at $833 million from 97 million units.
Unlike the TFT-LCD market dominated by Active Mat r i x TFT-LCD, the OLED market has predominantly Passive Matrix panels, with almost 99% of revenue and units coming from this segment till 2006. However, in 2007 some 20% revenue should come from Active Matrix OLEDs, with Samsung SDI, Kodak, Sony, and eMagin having already shipped an estimated 685,000 displays by Q2 07.
OLED technology is rapidly evolving. Changes are coming in materials, device structure, packaging, manufacturing equipment, and techniques. The greatest thrust seems to be in improving lifetime. Most OLEDs currently have lifetimes ranging from 5,000 to 20,000 hours. This is inadequate for applications such as computers and television. Currently the five most important applications are sub-display, MP3, main displays, car audio, and industrial.
