China Daily Global Edition (USA)
Chinese firms shining bright in display tech
Smartphones, TVs, tablets, wearable gadgets, vehicle screens to grow
Chinese display panel and home appliance manufacturers are betting big on next-generation cuttingedge semiconductor display technologies, which have huge application potential in smartphones, televisions, tablets, wearable gadgets, vehicle-mounted displays, virtual reality and augmented reality.
Such new display technologies utilize organic light-emitting diodes (OLED) and micro light-emitting diodes (micro LED). Industry insiders said compared with traditional liquid crystal display (LCD), the new display technologies have great improvements in terms of image contrast, brightness and color spectrum, thus further accelerating the upgrade of the display industry.
Domestic display panel suppliers such as BOE Technology Group Co Ltd and Visionox Technology Inc are doubling down on flexible active-matrix organic LED or AMOLED, which is a type of more flexible OLED.
BOE has launched a number of world-leading and innovative flexible display screens, which have been applied in premium flagship smartphone products, such as Honor’s Magic 3 series and Vivo’s iQOO 8.
Beijing-based market researcher Sigmaintell Consulting said BOE shipped about 25 million flexible OLED smartphone panels in the first half, up nearly 70 percent year-on-year, ranking first in the flexible display sector in the domestic market.
The company has three sixth-generation flexible AMOLED production lines. It started mass production of flexible panels at its facility in Chengdu, Sichuan province, in October 2017. The panels have already been used by more than 10 smartphone manufacturers.
The company’s second line in Mianyang, Sichuan province, started mass production in July 2019, while work on its third facility commenced in Chongqing in 2018.
“With the development of 5G, big data and cloud computing, display panels will change lifestyles and enhance visual experiences,” said Xu Fengying, vice-president of Visionox, adding that cutting-edge technologies will stimulate applications for flexible screens.
Xu said AMOLED will have wider applications in mobile phones, computers and smart wearables. Its displays have been used by smartphone giants like Xiaomi, Oppo and Huawei.
Visionox’s AMOLED display screen production line in Gu’an, Hebei province, launched operations in 2018. It can produce 30,000
glass substrates every month, and meet high-end, foldable screen demand for 90 million smartphones. It started building its second flexible AMOLED production line in Hefei, Anhui province, in December 2018.
“With the arrival of the 5G era, flexible AMOLED products have broad application scenarios due to their foldable and flexible characteristics. They will bring about differing and high-quality experiences for consumers,” said Chen Jun, vicepresident and chief analyst of Sigmaintell.
According to market research company Omdia, global OLED panel shipments for smartphones will reach 812 million units in 2022, an increase of 38.8 percent compared
with the estimated 585 million units in 2021.
In terms of OLED supply, Samsung Display is expected to remain the top market player next year, but its market share is expected to shrink and its dominant position may be challenged as Chinese panel manufacturers have entered the small and medium-sized OLED market and enhanced production skills, Omdia said.
Wang Xiaoya, an analyst from the mobile department of Sigmaintell, said apart from smartphones, the proportion of OLED panels used in smart wearable devices, tablets, computers, laptops, TVs and vehicledisplays has been continuously increasing in recent years.
In addition, Chinese television maker Skyworth Group is banking on large-sized OLED TVs, and has been producing OLED TVs in partnership with South Korea’s panel maker LG Display since 2013. At present, LG Display is the only company capable of mass-producing large-sized OLED screens globally.
Last year, direct revenue of the new display industry in China hit 446 billion yuan ($69 billion), accounting for 40.3 percent of the global total and ranking first worldwide, said Wang Zhijun, vice-minister of industry and information technology at the 2021 World Conference on the Display Industry in June.
As a newly developed technology, micro LED uses microscopic LEDs as individual pixels in the display and is regarded as the benchmark in next-generation display technology. Compared with LCD and OLED, micro LED technology has a very fast response time, high brightness, wide viewing angles and a long lifespan.
Data from LEDinside, a division of technology research firm TrendForce, showed that global revenue of micro LED products is expected to reach $694 million in 2022 and further swell to $2.9 billion in 2025.
Chinese television manufacturer Konka Group Co Ltd is ramping up efforts to expand into the semiconductor sector and increase research and development investment in micro LED display technology.
“We are focusing on building up a comprehensive system across the entire industrial chain, covering materials and equipment, chip design and wafer fabrication to packaging, testing and downstream applications,” said Zhou Bin, president of Konka.
Last year, Konka and Chongqing Bishan District Investment Platform jointly established the Chongqing Kangxin Semiconductor Industry Equity Investment Fund. With 2 billion yuan, the fund will focus on investments in semiconductornew materials and equipment, chips, integrated circuit designs, packaging and testing.
It also announced plans to invest 1.5 billion yuan to establish a micro LED research institute with Chongqing Liangshan Industrial Investment Co Ltd for the R&D, production and sales of micro LEDs in September 2019.
Li Hongtao, vice-president of Konka, said micro LED technology can be applied to a variety of scenarios from micro displays to large commercial displays and will certainly bring about enormous business opportunities, with its market scale expected to surpass $1 trillion in the future.
Furthermore, China Star Optoelectronics Technology Co Ltd, a subsidiary of home appliance giant TCL Technology Group Corp, has beefed up investment in mini LED displays and technological innovation. Mini LEDs are considered LEDs in the millimeter range, while micro LEDs are in the micrometer range.
TCL was the first company to use mini LEDs in its backlights when it introduced its 8 series 4K TV in 2019. So far, it has launched a wide range of mid-range to high-end mini LED TV products.
Mini LED will become a crucial display solution for TVs, the company said, adding that demand for mini LEDs has constantly expanded, which is conducive to reducing supply chain costs.
“We believe that mini LED technology will continue to shape the TV industry,” said Kevin Wang, CEO of TCL Industrial Holdings and TCL Electronics.
TCL said it will continue to develop innovative optical solutions with smaller backlights and thinner lens designs to provide imagery with the best clarity and industry-leading color performance with mini LED, 8K and quantum dot display technology.
Rong Chaoping, senior research manager at AVC Revo, a unit of market consultancy firm AVC, said panel manufacturers are pouring more capital into the research and development of new display technologies, while TV or smartphone manufacturers are ramping up efforts to launch related products.
After years of development, LCD technology has become very mature, but it faces some bottlenecks and could not meet the diversified needs of consumers for display products, Rong said. “The new display technologies will usher in speedy growth, along with the maturity of such technologies and continuous decline of costs.”
Roger Chu, research director at LEDinside, said micro LED itself has a lot of potential and could one day shine in lots of applications including VR devices, AR projection, optical sensors and fingerprint recognition, but LCD and OLED technology still dominate 100-inch and smaller display products.
The biggest challenge is to find ways to reach mass production in order to decrease manufacturing costs, Chu said, adding that mass production requires efforts across different industries, including LED, semiconductor devices and the entire display supply chain.
With the arrival of the 5G era, flexible AMOLED products have broad application scenarios due to their foldable and flexible characteristics. They will bring about differing and highquality experiences for consumers.”
Chen Jun, vice-president and chief analyst of Sigmaintell