LG Display settles talks over leak victims

LG Display agreed to terms about compensation with the families of two workers who died due to a nitrogen leak at the company’s OLED production line last week in Paju, Gyeonggi Province.

The company, the world’s biggest display panel producer, has also seen substantial progress in compensation talks with a family of another factory worker, who was in a critical condition, said officials at the LG Group’s display-making affiliate, Wednesday.

“LG Display offered a sizable amount of monetary compensation to the families of two LG workers who died during their work at our OLED line in Paju, and the families of the deceased accepted the terms of compensation,” according to an LG spokesman.

The official stressed LG’s top management sent its most heartfelt condolences and apologies to the families of the deceased.

“Talks with one of our workers in critical condition will progress because LG Display is fully responsible for the incident,” the official said without elaborating.

Those two deceased workers were involved in renovating the ninth floor of the E3 line at the P8 factory, which makes OLED screens for a number of consumer goods, including televisions.

Nitrogen makes up 80 percent of the Earth’s atmosphere but can cause asphyxiation when inhaled in its purest form.

Paju, the city near the North-South border, is home to a massive display complex operated by the LG affiliate. LG manufactures OLED and LCD screens for televisions there.

Separately, a local police department said it will announce results of its investigation of LG’s Paju facilities next week, said officials.

Since the incident, the nation’s labor ministry has continued conducting a full-scale safety check on the company’s facilities.

The company has established a special task force to resolve the issue and said it has been fully cooperating with the authorities investigating the incident.

The official said

it will seek to resume its OLED operations as quickly as possible and to minimize the monetary impact.

LG Group of technology affiliates led by LG Electronics, which owns 37.9 percent of LG Display, LG Innotek and LG Chem, are heavily promoting OLED televisions with LG Display taking the most significant role because it is in charge of handling the necessary display panels.

Euh Kyu-jin, an analyst at IBK Securities, expects the LG unit to achieve the largest quarterly profit for the first time in four years in the fourth quarter of this year.

The local brokerage said that the company will generate 620 billion won in operating profit in the October-December period, up 31 percent from a year earlier.