While we worry sometimes that DisplaySearch is too close to the display industry and has given false directions in the past over when display markets will rise and fall, its latest mission pushing OLEDs is something we want to believe, true or not.
OLED screens are clearer and better than LCDs and the handset industry needs them right now to deliver on its mission to make the best of touch screens on devices which show reasonable quality of video. But if this is delivered on LCD screens, it’s not good enough, too much reflection outdoors and not enough contrast. So let’s usher in the era of OLED.
The DisplaySearch quarterly OLED shipment numbers say that the total OLED display market will grow to $5.5 billion by 2015, and that it’s up from $0.6 billion last year which represents CAGR of 37%. What’s driving this is the adoption of active matrix OLED (AMOLED) displays as the main display in top end handsets and portable media players.
The introduction of AMOLEDS will be different from LCDs. When the LCD market was ramping it meant a radical change in the shape and cost structure of every device. Now it is purely a quality issue, although it is still a device differentiator. But the rate at which people need to build new factories and acquire plant and upgrade LCD factories to OLED is very different from the original adoption of flat screens.
But that expansion is coming says DisplaySearch and growth in AMOLED manufacturing capacity will mean soon the screens can be used on displays for netbooks and notebooks, then desktop monitors and finally the big TVs. DisplaySearch says that in 2015, TV will pass mobile phone main display to become the highest-revenue application at $1.92 billion ‘ so that’s a ways off, over 6 years and demonstrates how much slower this market is than LCD to take off. But our gut feel says that this is too slow, and that OLED may come down in manufacturing costs faster, accelerating the transition.
‘AMOLED displays have become an important differentiating factor for high-end electronic products,’ noted Jennifer Colegrove, Director of Display Technologies at DisplaySearch. ‘AMOLED revenues will exceed those from passive matrix OLEDs (PMOLEDs) in 2009, and AMOLED is likely to pass PMOLEDs in terms of unit shipments in 2010, driven by mobile phone main display applications.’
DisplaySearch also reported that worldwide OLED display revenue in Q4’08 was $156 million, up 17% quarter on quarter and annual revenues were $615 million, up 24% over 2007.
PMOLED had a weak Q4’08, caused by slowing shipments of monochrome and area color OLED. AMOLED experienced a strong quarter, driven by demand for mobile phone main displays, as Nokia, Samsung Electronics and Sony Ericsson heavily promoted AMOLED mobile phones in early 2009.
Samsung SDI, whose OLED group merged with Samsung Electronics’ mobile display in January 2009, had a strong Q4’08. As a result, Samsung SDI (now SMD) took the number 1 position in shipments with a 31% share, passing RiTdisplay.