​Xiaomi (1810.HK) is an exceptional company, growing rapidly over the last few years to become the 2nd largest smartphone brand last quarter.  That is not an easy thing to do against the marketing power of Samsung and Apple (AAPL), but the company developed a very savvy on-line marketing program that essentially started the concept of ‘spot’ sales that drew significant attention to a product that would normally have been low on the list of consumers.  The company now has a very diverse smartphone line and a number of other CE oriented products, but has just expanded their TV line to include three new OLED versions that have set the price bar a bit lower than most are used to.  The obvious objective is to stimulate OLED TV sales and broaden the Xiaomi TV appeal to those who want what would be a higher quality set, but in typical fashion, Xiaomi has used low prices to attract attention rather than competing directly with other OLED brands for the premium buyer.
The sets are still expensive in Xiaomi terms, but are considerably lower priced than those produced by LG Display, Sony (SNE) and others.  Without going into a detailed comparison of the features, mostly because all of the data is not yet available, the company’s 55” OLED model will sell for $771 (US) which compares to ~$1,300 for a Sony or LG model, most of which are last year’s models.  The 65” Xiaomi OLED set will sell for ~$1,80 as compared to ~$1,800 similar sets from LG, and the Xiaomi 77” model will sell for ~$2,625 against prices between  $2,800 and $3,300 for similar sets from others.
Again we note that these are price comparisons and don’t relate to feature sets and model characteristics, but we note that the only supplier of OLED TV displays is LG Display, so the panel price for Xiaomi and competitors would be the same or more depending on the quantity.  If somehow Xiaomi is getting OLED TV panels from a Chinese supplier (not likely), the cost would likely be much higher given that LG Display’s yield, after years of production, would likely be far higher than a new producer.
Will Xiaomi’s entry into the OLED market begin to make the technology more popular in China?  Perhaps, but Chinese consumers have been lukewarm toward the technology to date, likely because of a lack of local brands, but Xiaomi could help to give OLED TV a bit more momentum on the Mainland with such aggressive pricing.  That said, the company has yet to revel whether these TVs will be released outside of China, and if so, at what price, so we expect relatively little impact on OLED TV brand share over the next year, but Chinese brands have a particular focus on share and a company like Xiaomi can withstand some losses in the OLED TV segment against it profitable mobile business and that could sustain such prices for some time.  If Xiaomi OLED TVs stay local, the impact would be light, but that’s just what was thought of their smartphones years ago….

Weibo (WB) is always abuzz with glowing commentary concerning China’s prowess in the OLED space, with constant pointing to new fab capacity being brought on line weeks or months earlier than planned and Chinese branded smartphones sporting OLED displays with smaller camera cutouts or a camera that can take SLR quality pictures 3 feet underwater.  We certainly don’t disparage these accomplishments but they tend to paint a picture of the global mobile OLED market that looks like the planting of the Chinese flag in the middle of Seoul, South Korea.  Just to make sure we were not fooling ourselves, we went back to our OLED production data to see how much the balance between OLED producer share had changed over the last few quarters. 
Rather than work from raw capacity data, which does not take into account whether the fab is running all of the installed lines, the utilization of the lines that are operating, and the line-by-line yield, we are starting with unit volume production data and breaking that down according to size.  This gives a clearer picture of actual production in m2, rather than trying to make assumptions on the parameters just mentioned, particularly as panel producers are a bit loose on how they characterize production levels.  In fact we recently received clarification on a statement from a Chinese producer who had stated that a new fab was ‘open at its stated capacity’, which after a bit more detailed questioning, turned out to be, ‘the fab is complete and is ramping production’, giving a far different perspective on actual production than the original statement.
Looking at the data in Fig. 1, which shows the unit production share for flexible OLED panels, it is obvious that Samsung Display (pvt) holds the greatest share, although it certainly has declined over the last five quarters, especially if the 2Q forecast turns out to be correct, deteriorating from 81.7% in 1Q 2020 to a forecasted 51.5% in 2Q of this year.  Combining Samsung Display with LG Display (LPL), its South Korean rival and counterpart, their share of flexible OLED panel production declined from 90.3% in 1Q 2020 to (forecasted) 63.9% in 2Q 2021.  At the same time the share of Chinese flexible OLED panel producers rose from 9.7% in 1Q ’20 to 36.1% in 2Q 2021, which begs the question, are the Chinese OLED panel producers right to boast about releasing the strangle hold South Korean OLED producers have had on the market?
Before we answer that question, there is another chart to look at.  Fig. 2 depicts rigid OLED panel unit share over the same period, and while the basket of producers is the same as in Fig. 1, there are a number of major differences.  First, LG Display produces almost no rigid OLED panels, nor does China’s largest display producer BOE (200725.CH), leaving the market essentially to Samsung Display, EverDisplay (688538.CH), and Tianma (000050.CH), with the latter two being Chinese OLED producers.  Here again, Samsung Display’s share has declined from 93.5% in 1Q 2020 to 89.9% in 2Q, a far smaller decline than seen in flexible displays, but everyone knows that flexible displays are the most popular so the value of rigid OLED production is minimal, right?
Not really, and Fig. 3 shows that visually.  This chart combines the unit data from flexible and rigid OLED production, and Samsung Display’s dominance is even more obvious here, although still dropping from 88.3% in 1Q 2020 to 71.1% (f) in 2Q 2021.  But we still have not answered the question about flexible OLEDs being the more popular over rigid OLEDs.  The data in the table below shows the share of the composite data as to both flexible and rigid area, and while rigid starts the period at a higher share, by the end of the period, they are almost evenly split and average only 0.6% apart.  This belies the fact that flexible OLED displays are the more popular type, and while they capture the bulk of the press and a higher valuation, rigid OLED displays are the backbone of the mobile OLED space.
While there is certainly more nuance that can be derived from such data, China’s original premise, that they have ended the South Korean dynasty that has been ruling the OLED market since its inception is a bit premature, and with OLED display production for the iPhone 13 just underway, we would expect the South Korean share to rise for 3Q and 4Q, given that they are both the primary suppliers.  That said, the Chinese government has not backed away from supporting the Mainland OLED production space with subsidies and tax incentives, while producers outside of China must rely on self-financing or the global financial markets and Chinese OLED producers have certainly not backed away from the challenge of becoming the dominant supplier for mobile OLED displays, but we expect it will take some time to reach a point where they can claim a truly dominant share.  Raw capacity is important but filling that capacity is even more so.

​Last week we noted that Samsung Display has been considering adapting an idle Gen 8.5 LCD fab to the production of OLED displays.  While little has changed on an absolute basis, meaning SDC has not made any comments or decisions regarding such a conversion, but in our 08/02/21 note, we mentioned that Samsung and tool vendor Ulvac (6728.JP) had been developing a deposition system that would allow SDC to produce RGB OLED displays on a Gen 8.5 platform, a process that required the use of fine metal masks that were unable to scale above 6.  The tool, which is currently under evaluation by SDC, has a vertical deposition chamber, which eliminates the fine metal mask sagging issue that occurs when the deposition chamber is horizontal.
However, the SDC supply chain also seems to have caught the Gen 8 OLED fever as local tool vendors are said to be developing dry etchers that will be used during the TFT process, should it move forward over the next few months, with Wonik (240810.KS), and ICD (040910.KS), both local suppliers and Tokyo Electron (8035.JP) are all competing for such a potential order.  Dai Nippon Printing (7912.JP) is said to be developing the Gen 8.5 fine metal masks and Hims (238490.KS) is developing the tensioning frame for the masks.
What makes this a high risk game for all of these suppliers is the fact that Samsung Display has yet to make a final decision on whether to move the project forward, with the financial burden of the development costs resting on these potential suppliers.  If SDC does not qualify the Ulvac deposition tool, or at least allow it to move to the next stage of development, it could postpone or end the program, as the deposition tool modification program is the most important part of SDC’s potential for producing larger RGB OLED panels.  SDC and parent Samsung Electronics have rejected the concept of WOLED (White OLED), which is used by LG Display to produce its OLED TVs because it is not an RGB process and uses a color filter.  SDC has been very successful in producing small panel RGB displays, and is the global leader, but because of size limitations of the fine metal masks, it could not be scaled above Gen 6.  If successful with the new deposition process, SDC will be able to produce both OLED IT panels and potentially OLED TV panels under the process, which would have a marked impact on the OLED market.
There are a lot of ‘ifs’ here, and significant risk being taken by tool vendors, but if successful could lead to another Samsung Display equipment cycle that would broaden the OLED market and give SDC an alternative to the development of new technologies, such as QD/OLED or Micro-LEDs.  While we expect a final decision before the end of this year, the timeline for this type of project is still convoluted and open to speculation, but we expect that these tool vendors have been in discussions with SDC about the potential for the project’s implementation and have taken the R&D costs under the encouragement of SDC.  It’s a risky business, you’ve got to be in it to win it.

Never a dull moment for those involved in Universal Display (OLED), the primary supplier of OLED emissive materials.  After reporting 2Q sales results that were essentially in line with consensus and EPS $0.02 below consensus, the stock opened down 6.5% and has continued to decline at the time of this writing.  Noting that the stock has a 52 week range between $161.01 and $262.77 and that the company has beat expectations in each of the last four quarters, we understand that investors are fearful that there has been some major change in the company’s business or the OLED display space, but believe that such thinking comes from a lack of understanding of the display space and the OLED space in particular.
As always with Universal Display, there are number of moving parts that can affect quarterly numbers and the company reminds investors regularly that such factors can disconnect quarterly results from industry trends, but on a longer-term basis, which is the proper way to look at the OLED display space, we believe the trends tend to coincide.  This has been even more apparent since the advent of accounting rule ASC 606, which tied royalty and license revenue recognition to material sales for long-term contracts and reduced some of the wide swings in royalty and license revenue seen before the rule was put in place.
UDC reported material sales of $77.4m, down 3.0% q/q and up 123.7% y/y, although the y/y comparison, as with many display companies, is against a very weak quarter last year during the onset of COVID-19.  Material sales overall have been growing, as seen in Fig. 1, with the last two quarters above the long-term trend line.  Even breaking down the material sales into the two primary components, red emitter and green (includes yellow/green used by LG Display (LPL)), both remain above the trend lines.   Red OLED emitter is a component of all RGB OLED devices, which would include OLED smartphones, OLED tablets, and OLED notebooks and monitors, so again on a long-term basis, the growth of red emitter material would be linked to the growth of those products.  Green and green/yellow OLED material is used both in the same RGB displays indicated above, and is the primary emitter component of OLED TVs, so it is a bit harder to break out the growth of green OLED material as to product category.
Further complicating the breakdown of UDC’s sales is the fact that the regional breakdown, which in the past tied in closely with South Korean customers Samsung Display (pvt) and LG Display, became distorted when LG Display began producing OLED TV displays at it fab in Guangzhou, China, as those sales fall in with Chinese OLED producers and become harder to isolate.  This situation makes disaggregating UDC’s short-term sales considerably more difficult, and should push investors to rely less on quarterly results and more on yearly results, but that is not the world we live in, so UDC’s shares retain the volatility that trading parameters dictate rather than long-term growth.
There are two positive factors that will affect UDC’s long-term growth in material sales and license/royalty income.  The first is capacity growth, which is simply the timeline for OLED expansion and Greenfield OLED fab projects.  As we focus on projects that are either underway or have passed the early planning stage, we see OLED capacity growing as indicated in the table below.  This implies that out years will not include projects until they have been confirmed, so while we model beyond 2022, we expect 2023 and beyond to change considerably going forward.  Chinese OLED suppliers, such as BOE (200725.CH), Tianma (000050.Ch), and Visionox (002367.CH) are operating OLED production fabs, but relative to South Korean producers, are still in the relatively early stages of product development and full scale mass production.   China is determined to unseat South Korean OLED panel producers from their dominant position in the global market, and as they did in the LCD space, they will continue to expand production until they can capture significant share, which bodes well for the capacity that will further stimulate UDC’s sales. 
The other positive factor is panel size increase, which we have noted previously, and as LG Display continues to expand its OLED TV offerings by increasing panel size and adding capacity and the small panel OLED market, which has been primarily focused on smartphones, is beginning to expand into notebook and monitor panels, which will begin to absorb OLED capacity over the next few years.  With the penetration rate of OLED displays in smartphones nearing 50%, much of the incremental OLED capacity that will be added over the next few years will be dedicated to that market, but as these new OLED application grow, it will push the need for incremental capacity to feed these applications.  In fact there has been speculation that Samsung Display is considering refitting an idle LCD Gen 8.5 fab to produce OLED IT products, and while such plans are not yet in our model, they would be incremental to what is shown in the table below.
Of course there are offsets, particularly the desire by OLED panel producers to reduce the cost of OLED production, a portion of which could be based on replacing current OLED emitters with more efficient ones, and while UDC works toward these same goals for their customers, in theory such more efficient materials could result in smaller quantities being needed to produce the same results. This has been and remains an issue for some investors, who look at any quarterly decrease in material sales as validation that OLED producers are becoming more efficient, both wasting less emitter material and developing ways of using less to achieve the same results.  This is something UDC has been grappling with since its inception, but misses two points. 
First, one of the comparisons that LCD panel producers use against OLED displays is brightness, with LCD displays the brighter option.  OLED panel producers have found a number of ways to improve the brightness of OLED displays, but improving the OLED device’s ability to generate a brighter display is primarily a function of the materials in the OLED stack, so a more efficient material, meaning one that can convert more energy into light, would certainly get the attention of panel producers as they would be better able to compete against other display technologies 
Second, UDC’s OLED material contracts with producers are based on material volumes, which trigger set points at which the cost of the material to the purchaser declines.  Once that volume reaches a ‘terminal’ point, the price remains at the lowest level for the life of that OLED stack.  If UDC is able to generate a new OLED emitter composition that has better characteristics that the previous material, customers will switch, which resets the price table to its highest point, improving material margins.  This incentivizes UDC to produce new and more efficient OLED emitters to attract its customer base toward these premium products, and while that is counterintuitive to some, it is the basis for UDC’s ability to generate material margins in the 65% to 75% range.  While this quarter’s material margins were 67%, after 1Q’s 74%, we see this as a relatively short-term move similar to material cost increases seen by many others in the display space, and we expect a return to higher material margins over the next few quarters.
While the ups and downs of UDC’s shares are vitally important to some investors, we find many are principally focused on quarterly results that can boost performance, but looking at the OLED industry from the perspective of overall growth is a far better way to capture that growth without the distraction of overinflated or underinflated expectations.  We will continue to delve further into Universal Display next week, with more data for those that are interested in how UDC plays into the display space and the growth of the OLED segment.

Figure 2 - Red Emitter Sales - Source: SCMR LLC, Company Data           Figure 3 - Red Emitter Sales (Smoothed) - Source: SCMR LLC, Company Data; ​Figure 4 - Green Emitter Sales - Source: SCMR LLC, Company Data  Figure 5 - Green Material Sales (Smoothed) - Source: SCMR LLC, Company Data

The CE space is ripe with claims; Claims that ‘my product’ is the best, or ‘we have the largest market share, or our product has the best technology, and as folks who look at and catalog massive amounts of data, we understand that making such claims by citing data is not always quite ethical, as narrowing data sets is a way to bring up standing, and the fine print at the bottom of the page that defines the data is rarely read.  That said, OLED displays have been making claims about how they save power when compared to LCD displays for many years and while the fine print is again a part of the answer to the validity question, from a logical standpoint, they should be less power hungry, at least for small panel OLED devices.
Small panel OLED displays use red and green phosphorescent OLED materials and a blue fluorescent OLED material to produce full color displays.  Since these materials are self-emitting, when a segment of the display is black, those pixels are turned off, reducing power consumption.  This differs from LCD displays, which generate light from an LED backlight, which passes through a liquid crystal ‘gate’ and on to a color filter that changes the white light to the three colors necessary to produce the millions of colors needed.  However, when a section of the image is dark, the liquid crystal gate closes, blocking the light to the user, but the backlight itself remains on, and continues to consume power, so from a technical perspective, an OLED display should consume less power.
But what about real life?  Does this really make that much of a difference to smartphones users, who would be the most affected by battery issues?  While LCD display users are typically looking at images displayed on a white background, OLED users have been told that the best way to use their OLED smartphones effectively is to switch to ‘dark mode’, where the background is black, but some users are not used to ‘dark mode’ and have resisted the change, and likely have compromised much of the power saving benefits of OLED displays.  This is particularly apparent with iPhone users, who have been exposed to OLED displays for only 4 years and less if you count the entire iPhone line, compared to Samsung users, who have been using phones with OLED screens since 2004.
There are some ground rules however before the question gets answered, as the brightness of the display, and by this we mean the user controlled brightness, has a great deal to do with the power consumption, regardless of the technology, so there is a material difference in results that would be generated in bright sunlight where the display would be turned up to full brightness as to those generated in relatively dark lighting situations.  The answer also does not consider the consequences of high brightness and low brightness on color correctness and the phone’s ability to correct for these circumstances, but the data does include a number of different models (model years) of the same phone, and a number of different applications to see if the application itself influences the results.  We show in the table below the averages to reduce the amount of data.

​When looking at the averages for all four OLED smartphones, the data confirms that ‘dark mode’ is a power saver at all three brightness levels.  In terms of the applications tested, one phone saw a 1% increase in power consumption at the lowest (30%) brightness level for three of the six applications tested.  Other than that all phones saw a reduction in power which ranged from 1% to 69%, by switching to dark mode, in all brightness modes, for all applications.  So with only the minor exceptions noted (this was from the oldest of the four phones) dark mode is a big benefit for those using OLED smartphones, and regardless of whether the OLED display inherently saves power over an LCD display at a variety of brightness levels, switching to dark mode will make sure you drain the least amount from your battery and have the longest time to use the phone between charges.  Thanks to Purdue students for conducting the very detailed analysis.

Way back in 2013 when both Samsung (005930.KS) and LG Electronics (066570.KS) showed OLED TVs at CES, it looked like it was going to be a two-man race for dominance in the space, however in one of the more significant decisions in the display space over the last twenty years, Samsung decided that they would not pursue OLED TV production, citing what it called the inferior quality of the WOLED process and the lack of a cost-effective process for producing OLED TVs using the RGB process.  Samsung remained the biggest proponent of small panel OLED, which uses the RGB FMM (Fine Metal Mask) process to create three color pixels, but left the OLED TV space to rival LG, who is the dominant producer (essentially the only producer) of OLED TV panels.
As we have noted many times, Samsung’s affiliate, Samsung Display is pursuing the development of an alternative process for producing large size OLED TV panels (see above), but is still in the development stage and will likely not begin mass production until next year, and then on a relatively limited basis.But it seems that SDC is not putting all of its eggs in one basket and while working toward the finalization of its QD/OLED project, is exploring another alternative that could change Samsung’s attitude toward OLED TV by allowing it to produce large panel OLED TVs using the FMM process they use when producing small panel RGB OLED displays.
Using fine metal masks to produce small panel OLED displays on Gen 6 fabs works, but while the masks are extremely rigid, when they are used in larger generation fabs, they sag enough that the sub-pixels do not align properly, which has limited their use to Gen 6 fabs or smaller.  That said Samsung and tool supplier Ulvac (6728.JP) have developed a deposition system that rather than sits horizontally (where gravity works against the larger FMM) the deposition system is vertical, which negates the gravitational effect on the fine metal mask, and according to our friends at OLED-A, would allow fine metal masks to be used in a Gen 8.5 OLED fab.
Currently Samsung is evaluating the tool (produced by Ulvac) which would not only allow them to produce RGB OLED large panels but would ween them from deposition tool supplier Canon Tokki (7751.JP) who controls the OLED deposition tool market.  What makes this more interesting, if it pans out, is that the process, which mirrors SDC’s small panel OLED display process, would not require a color filter, which would reduce brightness, would not require quantum dot color conversion, would not require a ‘cut’ process[1], and would likely be cheaper than QD/OLED, and SDC has idle Gen 8.5 capacity that it could more easily convert to such a process than building greenfield lines for other large panel display modalities.
Of course, this is all based on considerable conjecture as the heart of the project, the deposition tool, is under evaluation, and if acceptable, would be quite expensive given its one-off nature.  That said, if, and there are still many potential ‘ifs’, Samsung is able to bypass the FMM issue and is able to produce large panel OLED displays using the RGB process, it will represent a big challenge for LG Display and could be a boon for OLED material suppliers, but we expect that we are still quite far away from this potential process being used in a mass production setting.  That said, it seems that SDC is serious enough to have worked with, and likely funded some of the new tool’s development, and while that does not guarantee its implementation, it certainly gives it a way in a very large door.


[1]   When large OLED panels are produced, while the substrate is Gen 8, the deposition steps require the panel be cut in half or in quarters, which means more expensive deposition tools or slower and therefore more expensive processing.

​With the Olympics about to start, the question of how much influence do events such as the Olympics or the FIFA World Cup have over TV sales.  Historically marketing in front of such events has been intense, with the objective of convincing consumers that their puny 42” TV is just too small for getting the full impact of such events, and an upgrade to an 86” 4K TV is the least that would influence friends to come over and watch.  We have seen data that takes both sides of the question, but have yet to be convinced that in the general scheme of things, such events can make an appreciable difference over the course of a year.  Overall economic factors seem to be a far more influence on TV sales, along with price, and with global TV shipments between 210m and 220m for the last 5 years, such major events don’t seem to move the needle.
As the Olympics are in Japan this year, we took a closer look at TV shipments in Japan, as the COVID-19 pandemic will be keeping spectators at home rather than in the stands, with the thought that perhaps that might actually stimulate TV sales, and while TV shipments in Japan in 1H were up 21.0% y/y, there is so little consistency in the y/y numbers going back 5 years that no conclusion can be drawn.  What the data did show however is that Japan TV shipments have been increasing over the last few years (Fig. 1), and May and June were both up 14.9% and 11.3% y/y respectively this year, but again there is little consistency in the historical data for those months.
While the trend is up for TV sales in Japan, the trend for OLED TV shipments has been even stronger, increasing from 14,000 in January 2019 to 74,000 in June of this year, representing a share increase from 4.4% at the start of the period (1/2019) to 14.1% in June of this year.  We note that Japan is a relatively small portion of global TV shipments, between 2.2% and 2.5% over the last few years, and with Japanese TV brands being favorites on the island, slow OLED adoption by traditional Japanese brands other than Sony (SNE) has hampered OLED adoption.  With LG Display’s (LPL) increased OLED TV panel capacity, we would expect OLED TV share in Japan to continue to increase as traditional Japanese TV brands are able to secure enough product to justify OLED advertising programs and set production.

There are a number of ways OLED displays can be manufactured.  Small panel OLED displays, such as those used in smartphones and tablets, are produced using a FMM (Fine Metal Mask), a metal sheet with highly defines holes that allow the OLED material to be placed in specific positions on a substrate.  By using 3 colors (Red, Green, and Blue) and moving the mask with each color application, RGB pixels are created, however there are limitations as to the size of such masks as the larger they become the more they flex and bend, causing incorrect pixel placement.
OLED TVs are produced differently however, with two OLED materials coated across the entire substrate.  The light that is created by mixing these two OLED materials is white and then passes through a color filter, essentially a sheet of red, green, and blue phosphor dots that convert the white light to the three colors necessary to create an image, all of which are individually controlled by TFT (Thin-film transistor) circuitry.
 In both cases OLED material is not only coating the substrate but also the mask and the walls of the deposition chamber, and over time the process needs to be stopped, the mask replaced, and the chamber cleaned.  Not only is what is an expensive material wasted, but the downtime raises the cost of the process.  In order to increase the efficiency of OLED material usage, a number of companies have come up with a process that deposits the OLED materials as ‘inks’ from what is essentially a large scale ink-jet printer that places the materials in precise locations on the substrate without a mask.  In theory this process should be close to 100% efficiency as to material usage and has significant control over ink placement, but no without limitations.
As the OLED materials must be dissolved in a solution to allow them to pass through the ink-jets, the solvent and OLED material mixture must not change the characteristics of the resulting OLED ‘dot’, and the time it takes to ‘cure’ (dry) the ink is also a gating factor as to the speed of the process.  Solution based OLED materials are becoming more refined and comparable to OLED deposition materials, but the ink-jet process for RGB OLED is relatively new and still being developed.  JOLED (pvt), a spin-off of Japan Display (6740.JP) seems to be the leader in the printed OLED category, along with JDI itself, and while LG Display (LPL) is able to produce both RGB and WOLED (White OLED), they have opted to use JOLED’s ink-jet printed OLED display panel for their first OLED monitor.
The display itself has a number of characteristics that set it apart from more typical monitors, but the primary difference (aside from price) are the color characteristics.  OLEDs displays in general are prized for their color accuracy and this monitor is both factory calibrated and allows the user to make modifications to settings and store them for later use.  This is essential for those who work I the video industry, particularly colorists, who are responsible for maintaining a consistent set of characteristics throughout an film.  This is an indication as to where LG expects its target market to be for this device as it does not have a number of the characteristics needed for gaming, a fast-growing sub-set of the monitor segment.  It does have higher resolution (4K) than most monitors, although gaming monitors using 4K are becoming more common, but at a 60Hz refresh rate, most gamers will assume the display is not fast enough to prevent image smearing.
The LG monitor is also lacking in brightness, a bit of an issue for OLED displays generally, or at least those using a color filter, as the CF only allows the light for a single color dot to pass through, blocking the other two, which reduces the brightness of the display.  That said, as the target audience, colorists and video production engineers will likely be using the display in a low light setting, it would be less of an issue in those applications.  While the price is $4,000 this is not unusual for monitors that are designed for such applications as we have seen such monitors run over $10,000, we expect the use of the ink-jet process for OLED displays, even in this limited setting and application, should bring down the overall cost of IJP based display OLED displays when compared to typical deposition based OLED displays. That said this will not be a rapid change as IJP OLED is not yet a common process and tends to be used in highly specialized applications that can absorb the higher current cost of what will one day become a lower cost process.
We compare a number of currently available monitors in the table below, although we note that color characteristics for many monitors are not available from manufacturers and typically are far from those of the new LG monitor:

​Over the years there has been much speculation as to the effect of major sporting events on television sales, however what little data that has been presented concerning the connection between TV set sales and large sporting events tends to focus on the pull-in before such events and not the overall set growth over a more extended period.  That said, while this year’s Olympic games in Japan have been nothing if not controversial, a few indications that the event, at least in Japan, is having an influence on local TV sales.   
This year’s Olympics will not allow fans to attend, a number of Japanese retailers have indicated that starting in the 2nd half of May and extending into June, they have seen TV sales increase by 10% to 20% over last year’s volume, with one retailer seeing an over 2x increase.  More interesting than the y/y growth is the point that those indicating increased sales have said the best-selling product during the pre-Olympic sales have been 65” OLED TVs, which tend to be more expensive than LCD TVs.  While the data from the Japan Electronics & Information Technology Industry Association does indicate that the number of OLED TV shipments in May grew by 165.6% to 65,000 units, which was a record, it does not break down OLED TV sizes in the data. 
The data does indicate that the value of OLED TV shipments in May in Japan was ¥17b ($155.4m US), up 163% from the same period last year, indicating an average OLED TV price of $2,405, down just slightly from last year’s May average OLED TV price of $2,428 in today’s dollars, indicating that the popularity of OLED TVs is increasing even though the price (in Japan) has stayed relatively the same.  Historically TV prices in Japan have been higher than those in the US.  While the average OLED TV price has remained the same, we suspect that the average size has increased a bit at the same time, although we do not have data to back up that assumption.