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The display industry enters the second quarter of this year with some optimism as demand has picked up in response to the preparation for Chinese Labor Day sales. Still, panel makers are actively seeking ways to cut their costs further as the downward price pressure in the market has not diminished since the latter half of 2015.
Global shipments of LCD TV sets in the first quarter of 2016 totaled about 48.32 million units, according to the latest report by WitsView, a division of TrendForce. This figure represents a 20.9% quarterly decline and also a 6.3% year-on-year drop. In addition to first quarter being the off season in the U.S. and Europe, the uncertain global economic outlook and the saturation of the Chinese TV market have put significant pressure on the overall LCD TV shipments.
The display technology industry has seen a significant expansion in the production of LCD panels with IGZO (indium gallium zinc oxide) thin-film transistor (TFT) backplane. WitsView, a division of TrendForce, estimates that the global production capacity of IGZO panels by area will reach about 6.9 million square meters this year, up 45% from 2015. A Gen-8.5 fab owned by major Chinese panel supplier CEC-Panda is currently responsible for much of this capacity expansion.
The shipments of IGZO panels worldwide totaled 5.05 million units in 2015 and are forecast to skyrocket by 296% year on year to 20 million units in 2016 owing to the demand generated by Apple’s latest tablet, the 9.7-inch iPad Pro, according to WitsView, a division of TrendForce.
Large-size LCD TVs are more affordable than ever and have become the main choice for first-time buyers and families looking to replace their older TV sets. The market for small-size LCD TVs on the other hand is on the wane. “As LCD TVs get larger in size, panel manufacturers in the upstream of the supply chain will capitalize on this trend and expand the size of their panel products to increase the consumption of panel capacity,” said Ricky Lin, research manager for WitsView, a division of TrendForce.
