Global shipments of LCD TVs increased by a less-than-expected 7 percent last year to 205 million units from 2010, as major TV brands focused on digesting inventories through much of the year amid a weak global economy, NPD DisplaySearch said on Wednesday.
The 7 percent increase in shipments was less than the 9 percent growth forecast made by market researchers two months ago. On Jan. 3, DisplaySearch predicted global LCD TV shipments would rise from 206 million units last year to 225 million units this year.
Last week, WitsView, an LCD research arm of TrendForce Corp (集邦科技), said global LCD TV shipments reached 200.5 million units last year and forecast the figure would increase 8 percent to 216.5 million this year.
Whether a 7 percent or 9 percent increase, there was a “substantial slowdown” in shipment growth last year from the double-digit growth seen in previous years, according to the latest Quarterly Global TV Shipment and Forecast Report.
The US-based researcher attributed last year’s poor performance to the lowest annual growth reported in the fourth quarter.
In that period, worldwide shipments of LCD TVs grew by just 1 percent year-on-year to 64.24 million units, marking the lowest growth rate since DisplaySearch began tracking global TV shipments in 2004. The figure was 24 percent higher than the previous quarter, according to DisplaySearch’s tallies.
Together with a fall of 7 percent in plasma TV shipments last year and a plunge of 34 percent in -cathode-ray tube (CRT) TV sales since 2010, DisplaySearch said overall TV shipments fell 0.3 percent to 247.7 million units worldwide last year, after six consecutive years of growth.
“The causes of the slow demand in 2011 were complex and although LCD TV showed growth, results were well below industry expectations,” Paul Gagnon, director of DisplaySearch’s North America TV research team, said in an e-mailed statement. “The low level of shipments was partially caused by excessive inventory levels early in 2011 for the US and European markets, as well as a sharp drop in demand in Japan following the end of the government sponsored Eco-Points program that caused a surge in replacement activity during 2009 to 2010.”
The report also found that Samsung Electronics Co led the global flat-panel TV market in the fourth quarter, with a 26.3 percent share of total revenue. The South Korean company was the market leader in LCD TVs and plasma TVs in terms of fourth-quarter revenue, as well as the number one brand in 3D TVs and LED TVs in terms of shipments for the quarter.
LG Electronics Inc was the No. 2 company in the global flat-panel TV market, with a 13.4 percent share of total revenue, while Sony Corp rounded out the top three with a 10 percent share, the report said.
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