Industry watchers yesterday reported high expectations for the global digital television (DTV) set market in coming years, saying this growth in demand should help the nation's TV set original-equipment manufacturers (OEMs).
Global DTV set shipments are expected to reach 93 million units in 2008 from 17 million units this year, a leap of nearly 450 percent, according to a report released earlier this week by In-Stat/MDR, a high-tech market research firm based in Arizona.
"There are two important trends in the TV set market today," In-Stat/MDR analyst Michelle Abraham said in a statement.
Cathode-ray-tube TVs are being replaced with other kinds of TVs, including flat-panel and rear-projection sets, and digital tuners are being integrated in large TV markets like North America, Europe and Japan, the statement said.
A flat-panel analyst at Yuanta Core Pacific Capital Management (
Along with the global tendency toward digital broadcasting in the US and European countries, Taiwanese household-appliance companies started expanding to global markets through the OEM model, he said.
The US Federal Communications Commission decided in 2002 to phase in digital TV-set tuners starting this year, and the process is scheduled to conclude by July 2007.
Shipments of TV sets integrated with digital tuners are estimated at 6 million units worldwide this year, up from 3.1 million last year, said Sharice Lin (
The number is expected to surge to over 10 million units next year, driven by the US regulations as well as by increasing digital terrestrial broadcasters, she said.
"We expect the regulation to boost Taiwan's shipment of TV sets with built-in digital tuners by a large scale," said Gary Chen (陳昭宙), spokesman for Sampo Corp (聲寶), the nation's biggest TV-set maker with around a 30 percent market share.
The company's digital TVs account for more than 10 percent of over 300,000 shipments of liquid-crystal display and plasma-display- panel TVs, and 70 to 80 percent of digital TVs are for export, Chen said.
Sampo's clients consist of global leading TV brands such as Thomson and Philips.
Besides Sampo, nearly 20 TV-makers have already jumped into the sector as well, including Tatung Co (
Taiwanese OEMs must make inroads into the sector by snapping up this opportunity for business expansion, Yuanta Core Pacific's Chen said.
The domestic market has developed slowly due to high prices and a lack of sufficient and appealing digital content, he said. The market is expected to boom by 2008, he said.c
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