Electronics

With its characteristics of flexibility, lightness and thinness, and high color gamut, OLED has become the first choice for the replacement of mobile phone display technology, and it has also become the standard for many high-end mobile phones. Previously, Samsung was the dominant player in the field of OLED panels in the smartphone market, and almost had the right to speak in the entire industry. The flagship products of many smartphone brands, including Apple, OPPO, and VIVO, all used Samsung AMOLED panels. However, recently, this situation seems to be quietly changing.

The latest report by market research firm Omdia pointed out that Samsung’s display market share of OLED panels has fallen from 80% in 2020 to 77% in 2021, and may further fall to 65% in 2022. The market share of China's OLED panel is expected to rise from 15% in 2021 to 27% in 2022. With the acceleration of OLED screens in smart phones, major panel manufacturers have launched fierce competition. Especially after Chinese manufacturers have entered the market one after another, the entire industry has set off a new round of life-and-death competition.

Samsung suspends LCD production line and fully expands OLED production capacity

Recently, Samsung Display officially launched a project to convert the TV LCD 7-2 production line in Tangjing to an OLED panel production line. It plans to complete the dismantling of the original production line before July 20, and then build a sixth-generation small and medium-sized OLED panel production line. Plan to invest 17 billion yuan to increase the production capacity of OLED panels.

Some commentators said that benefiting from the hotness of the smart phone display market, the demand for OLED panels is rapidly expanding. If Samsung Display's production capacity cannot quickly keep up, its popular dominance will be shaken. The dismantling of the LCD production line this time is also trying to secure the first "seat" in small and medium-sized OLED panels.

It is worth noting that since 2020, mid-to-high-end models such as Huawei and Nova have adopted flexible AMOLED technology. OPPO, vivo, Xiaomi and Honor are also increasing the proportion of flagship models using OLED panels. Apple is no exception. It was previously reported that Apple will purchase 169 million OLED panels this year, increasing to 190 million in 2022.

Zhang Zhihua, a senior analyst at OFweek's Industry Research Center, pointed out that there is a high probability that Apple’s new OLED screen will be supplied by Samsung Display this year. Later, as other OLED panel manufacturers continue to put into mass production, LG, Sharp, JDI, and various mainland China OLED panel manufacturers in Taiwan and China are likely to be included in their supplier evaluation system.

Many Chinese manufacturers compete in the OLED panel market

According to Omdia’s forecast, China’s largest display panel company BOE’s market share is expected to expand from 6% in 2021 to 13% in 2022, TCL China Star Optoelectronics will increase from 2% to 6%, and Tianma will increase from 1% to 4%. .

In fact, the rise of Chinese panel makers has long been traced. Beginning in 2009, TCL Technology, BOE, Huike and other companies have successively increased production and quickly occupied the TV LCD panel market, which accounts for 70% of the global panel market’s total shipments, forcing South Korean companies to focus on the OLED market.

Now, under the influence of multiple favorable factors such as government policy encouragement, continuous investment of industrial capital, and increasing demand in the terminal application field, many Chinese manufacturers including BOE, Visionox, TCL China Star, Shenzhen Tianma, etc. have begun to vigorously deploy OLED-related fields , Is expected to replicate the successful path in the competition of TV LCD panels.

Public data shows that China's OLED production capacity has rapidly increased from 1.1% in 2016 to 13% in 2020. In 2020, China's OLED production capacity has reached 4.388 million square meters. In addition, there are many OLED production lines under construction, and domestic OLED production capacity is continuously increasing.

Omdia said that although there are still gaps in OLED technology, with the influx of capital and talents, Chinese manufacturers will quickly improve their production technology, threatening Korean manufacturers' leadership in the OLED market.

Industry insiders commented: “At present, in the domestic smartphone market, the localization rate of OLED panels is increasing rapidly. The development of domestic OLED panel manufacturers is not only to maintain the safety of downstream enterprises’ industrial chain and improve bargaining power, but also more important. It can support the development of downstream enterprises through its own technology."

Domestic OLED industry chain still needs to make up for shortcomings

On the whole, the OLED panel industry chain covers upstream materials and equipment, midstream R&D, production, and downstream applications. It involves a wide range of parties and has many participants. Although the production capacity has continued to be released strongly in recent years, there are still many shortcomings in the industry chain. The board urgently needs to be made up.

At the technical level, core patents in the OLED field are still concentrated in the hands of Korean companies, and independent research and development capabilities need to be strengthened. Take Samsung's technical patent in the subdivision field of OLED display technology in the inner folding screen as an example. This patent can simplify the stack structure of OLED displays. If domestic panel manufacturers want to bypass this process, they must solve production problems through more complex processes, which will also increase production costs.

Industry experts suggest that the advantages of gathering scientific research resources should be used to increase support capital investment, strengthen the research and development of upstream materials, core manufacturing equipment and key technologies in the display field, and promote breakthroughs, transfer and commercialization of key common technologies. At the same time, it encourages advantageous enterprises to take the lead in organizing relevant enterprises and research institutions to carry out strategic cooperation and collaborative research, actively reserve and deploy patents, and form a strict core technology patent protection network.

However, there is also encouraging news. The technological gap between domestic OLED manufacturers and Korean companies has gradually narrowed. In terms of technology patents, domestic panel giant BOE has applied for more than 27,000 patents on OLED display screens, gradually surpassing South Korean display giant LG. Aolaide has achieved technological breakthroughs in a variety of sublimated luminescent materials, and successfully independently developed and produced evaporation sources for vapor deposition machines. Wanrun has also made breakthrough progress in the optical matching layer and TADF green light monomer materials, and the product volume is about to increase.

At present, Chinese manufacturers still have a lot of room for improvement in the production capacity and yield of flexible AMOLED. Although BOE Chengdu, TCL Huaxing Wuhan and other production lines have achieved mass production, the production capacity is still limited. And from the perspective of profitability, domestic AMOLED still has a certain margin for profit improvement. The price of some domestic AMOLED panels is even the same as that of LTPS LCD mobile phone panels. There is a situation of "price for quantity", and the core competitiveness of products has not yet formed.

According to Liu Tun, a senior analyst at CCID Consulting, as the output of BOE Mianyang's flexible AMOLED production line climbs, Visionox's two full-flex AMOLED production lines in Hefei and Guangzhou will achieve mass production in 2021, and BOE Chongqing's flexible AMOLED production line Put into production at the end of 2021, my country's flexible AMOLED strength is expected to be improved. "Domestic manufacturers should continue to work hard in terms of mature AMOLED production line technology innovation and application, production capacity increase to form a scale effect, and improvement of the ability to bundle with terminal brand customers, in order to further activate the profit margin of AMOLED products."