[SID 2017] Premium TV market, LCD vs OLED war re-ignition

In the premium TV market in 2017 OLEDs seemed to catch up early with LG Electronics’ OLED TV sales volume growth and Sony’s OLED TV market gains. However, with the announcement of AUO, Taiwan’s leading LCD maker, that LCDs are more advantageous in the premium TV market than OLEDs, once again, competition between OLED TVs and LCD TVs is expected to intensify.

In the keynote session of SID 2017 held in Los Angeles, USA from May 22, AUO CEO Paul Peng made a presentation with the theme of “The warring states of display technologies” that LCDs would continue to outperform OLEDs in the premium TV market.

Paul Peng has three major claims that LCD is more dominant.

First is the performance that LCD is superior to OLED in terms of maximum size, peak brightness, ambient contrast ratio, color gamut, image sticking, and lifetime.

Second is the cost. In the black Friday in 2016, 65-inch HDR 4K narrow bezel LCD TV was US $ 1,099, while OLED was more than double with US $ 2,800.

Lastly, eco friendly. The industrial water used in the manufacturing process is used more for OLED manufacturing than LCD, and the power consumption of OLED is about twice that of LCD. The replacement cycle is 2 to 4 years for OLED, but LCD is 5 to 8 years which is more than twice as high as LCD, so is more environmentally friendly than OLED.

Since the launch of OLED TVs, there has been intense competition between LCD and OLED camps, but OLED market share continues to rise in the premium mobile market, and even in the premium TV market OLED seemed to be ahead of LCD. However, with AUO’s announcement in the keynote of SID 2017, the world’s largest display society, it is expected to intensify the fierce battle between OLED and LCD in the display industry.