Taiwanese flat-panel makers lost market share to their South Korean rivals in the ultra-high-definition (UHD) panel market for the first time last quarter due to a lack of sufficient new products, market researcher WitsView said yesterday.
Last quarter, Taiwan seized a 43 percent share of the UHD, or 4K2K, panel market in terms of shipments, compared with South Korea’s 49 percent, according to WitsView’s tallies.
In the first quarter, Taiwan had 54 percent market share, ahead of South Korea’s 35 percent, WitsView said. Last year, Taiwanese firms secured a 76 percent share, it said.
WitsView said Samsung Electronics Co and LG Display Co were gearing up to roll out a full series of UHD TV panels last quarter, including the low-cost RBGW displays, while some of China’s major TV brands such as Xiaomi Corp (小米) have sourced UHD TV displays from South Korean makers.
“Customers are gradually adopting the new UHD TV panel size,” WitsView senior analyst Jeffy Chen (陳建安) said by telephone.
While Innolux Corp (群創) has been educating clients and consumers that its UHD TV panels perform much better than the low-cost RGBW displays, the Taiwanese company is in a product transition period as it started shipping 39.5-inch UHD TV displays earlier this year to replace 39-inch screens, he said.
“innolux began shipping 39.5-inch UHD tv panels in the first quarter, but customers have been slow in adopting the new panels," Chen said. "The low-cost RGBW display did have some impact on Taiwanese panel makers.”
Overall 4K2K panel shipments reached 4.47 million units last quarter, bringing the total shipments in the first half to 6.27 million units, WitsView said.
For the full year, shipments are expected to grow to 15 million units, Chen said.
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