E Ink Holdings Inc (元太科技), the world’s largest e-paper display supplier, yesterday said business is recovering gradually from an inventory correction cycle thanks to rapid and smooth technology upgrades in using new color e-paper displays on electronic readers and electronic shelf labels (ESLs).
The company said most customers are expected to level off extra older-generation color e-paper displays used in ESLs this quarter, resulting in a pickup in the third quarter. What is more encouraging is that a large retailer in North America has started replacing paper labels with ESLs, joining its European and Chinese peers.
The company expects new four color e-paper displays used in ESLs would account for about 90 percent, from 80 percent, of total ESL shipments.
Photo: Lisa Wang, Taipei Times
“We believe the first quarter is the lowest point. Our revenue in the second quarter will be better than the first quarter,” E Ink chairman Johnson Lee (李政昊) told media on the sideline of the Touch Taiwan display show in Taipei yesterday.
The main growth drivers this year would be electronic readers and electronic notebooks due to the display upgrade, Lee said.
“Customers said sales of their electronic readers with color displays are much better than they had expected,” Lee said, adding that the company’s equipment is fully utilized.
The company believes large e-paper displays would be the next growth driver, Lee said. The 32-inch cooler e-paper displays demonstrated equally good color performance compared with paper prints and should be a good replacement for paper posters, he said.
E Ink said that its new larger e-paper displays for public displays are to enter volume production early next year, after a new factory in Hsinchu starts operations at the end of this year.
Flat-panel makers AUO Corp (友達) and Innolux Corp (群創) also expect a gradual recovery starting in the second half of this year, backed by rising demand for panels used in large TVs and new artificial intelligence (AI) PCs.
AUO said demand for TV panels is picking up, indicating that the display industry has hit its bottom, after suffering the most in 2022 and last year.
The company witnessed a pickup in demand for 65-inch TV panels ahead of the Paris Olympics and UEFA Euro 2024, which are to take place in second and third quarters, AUO said.
“The display industry has weathered through the worst period in 2022 and 2023. The industry has returned to the healthy track,” AUO chairman Paul Peng (彭双浪) said. “We expect the introduction of AI PCs in the second half of this year to bring strong demand.”
The price of 65-inch TV panels are expected to rise at the fastest rate of 2.9 percent sequentially to about US$176 per unit this month, compared with price increases between 1.6 and 2.8 percent estimated for for 55-inch, 43-inch and 22-inch TV panels, price information provided by market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) showed.
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