OLED IT – Getting Noticed
We have mentioned the expansion of OLED into notebooks and monitors often over the last year as Samsung Display (pvt) and parent Samsung Electronics (005930.KS) try to stimulate that business into one with dedicated capacity and high volume customers. Both can see that the growth of OLED in the smartphone business, while robust in terms of units and share, will slow overall as penetration rates reach almost 60% next year and competition continues to increase, particularly from Chinese small panel OLED producers. While the share for individual Chinese small panel OLED producers is relatively small compared to Samsung, China’s largest LCD producer BOE (200725.CH) has been relentless in pursuing Apple (AAPL) to enter their small panel OLED supply chain, and has recently been given preliminary status, and in the OLED wearables market, primarily watch displays, almost every OLED producer has a few offerings, including a number of producers that are passive matrix OLED display suppliers..
Given that Samsung Display is essentially out of the large panel OLED business currently, the logical extension of their OLED business would be into what would be called medium panel sizes, the home of notebooks, monitors and tablets, otherwise known as IT. Samsung is the dominant producer in the OLED IT space, and at the distribution level faces competition from China’s Everdisplay (688538.CH) and Japan’s JOLED (pvt) (monitors), and in the tablet space comes up against BOE, Chinastar (pvt) and EDO, but Apple’s adoption of OLED display technology in the Apple Watch in 2016 and its full adoption of OLED across the iPhone line, lead many to believe Apple will continue to push OLED technology further up the product line into the iPad and eventually to the Mac line. That said, Apple is certainly not one to rush into a technology change and rumors about plans for Apple’s continued display transition to OLED are fraught with delays, technical considerations, and capacity issues, so in the interim Samsung is the leading voice in pushing OLED further into the IT space.
2021 has been a good year for OLED laptops, albeit a good year (thus far) for laptops in general, but there are a number of notable brands, particularly Asus (2357.TT) and Lenovo (992.HK), that have been marketing OLED laptops, and to a lesser degree, with a number of brands offering OLED displays as an option in a number of products. The biggest issue for OLEDs in laptops is price, although we expect to see a number of models fall below $1,000 before year end, as on a general basis OLED displays are more expensive than LCD displays, particularly for sizes where volumes are relatively low, however that gap has been narrowing as LCD panel prices have been increasing through much of this year. Samsung is evaluating its expansion plans for medium size OLED panel capacity and could add Gen 6 or Gen 8 dedicated IT capacity that would help to lower the cost of OLED IT panels, with the biggest risk to that scenario being the rate of Apple’s adoption in products larger than smartphones.
Samsung certainly has been known to build capacity in anticipation of market growth, and can absorb some of that potential capacity itself (expectations are for 6m to 6.5m units this year and 10m in 2022, with 80% going to laptops this year), but Apple is not going to make a large jump until it is assured that its specifications can be met, and that could take time. LG Display (LPL) is also a supplier of OLED displays for the iPhone and has built out dedicated capacity for Apple in the past, so there is competition for Samsung right from the start, but Samsung’s massive promotion machine seems to have been able to gain traction this year, and we expect will be working at full steam as we get closer to CES 2022. There are competing LCD technologies, particularly quantum dot films used to enhance LCD displays and potentially Mini-LEDs, but Samsung is a leader in the QD space and can offer a wide variety of IT products that will satisfy almost any user without having to take a singular stance on any one technology. Sometimes its good to be Samsung when you want something to be noticed.
Given that Samsung Display is essentially out of the large panel OLED business currently, the logical extension of their OLED business would be into what would be called medium panel sizes, the home of notebooks, monitors and tablets, otherwise known as IT. Samsung is the dominant producer in the OLED IT space, and at the distribution level faces competition from China’s Everdisplay (688538.CH) and Japan’s JOLED (pvt) (monitors), and in the tablet space comes up against BOE, Chinastar (pvt) and EDO, but Apple’s adoption of OLED display technology in the Apple Watch in 2016 and its full adoption of OLED across the iPhone line, lead many to believe Apple will continue to push OLED technology further up the product line into the iPad and eventually to the Mac line. That said, Apple is certainly not one to rush into a technology change and rumors about plans for Apple’s continued display transition to OLED are fraught with delays, technical considerations, and capacity issues, so in the interim Samsung is the leading voice in pushing OLED further into the IT space.
2021 has been a good year for OLED laptops, albeit a good year (thus far) for laptops in general, but there are a number of notable brands, particularly Asus (2357.TT) and Lenovo (992.HK), that have been marketing OLED laptops, and to a lesser degree, with a number of brands offering OLED displays as an option in a number of products. The biggest issue for OLEDs in laptops is price, although we expect to see a number of models fall below $1,000 before year end, as on a general basis OLED displays are more expensive than LCD displays, particularly for sizes where volumes are relatively low, however that gap has been narrowing as LCD panel prices have been increasing through much of this year. Samsung is evaluating its expansion plans for medium size OLED panel capacity and could add Gen 6 or Gen 8 dedicated IT capacity that would help to lower the cost of OLED IT panels, with the biggest risk to that scenario being the rate of Apple’s adoption in products larger than smartphones.
Samsung certainly has been known to build capacity in anticipation of market growth, and can absorb some of that potential capacity itself (expectations are for 6m to 6.5m units this year and 10m in 2022, with 80% going to laptops this year), but Apple is not going to make a large jump until it is assured that its specifications can be met, and that could take time. LG Display (LPL) is also a supplier of OLED displays for the iPhone and has built out dedicated capacity for Apple in the past, so there is competition for Samsung right from the start, but Samsung’s massive promotion machine seems to have been able to gain traction this year, and we expect will be working at full steam as we get closer to CES 2022. There are competing LCD technologies, particularly quantum dot films used to enhance LCD displays and potentially Mini-LEDs, but Samsung is a leader in the QD space and can offer a wide variety of IT products that will satisfy almost any user without having to take a singular stance on any one technology. Sometimes its good to be Samsung when you want something to be noticed.
OLED Smartphone Shipments & ROC - Source: SCMR LLC, Various
OLED Smartphone Share - Source: SCMR LLC, Various
Figure 2 - OLED Smartphone Production - Regional Share - Source: SCMR LLC, Stone Ptrs.
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