Financial | OLED-Info

A group of investors from China and Taiwan to invest up to $700 million in Japan Display

In August 2017, Japan Display announced a last-resort strategic focus on OLED displays as the Japanese display maker failed to understand how quickly the industry will shift to OLED displays. JDI said it will need to raise $1.7 billion if it was to start OLED mass production (hopefully by the end of 2019).

According to Japan's Kyodo News Agency, a group of investors from China and Taiwan have agreed to invest 60-80 billion Yet ($540-721 million USD) in order to bailout JDI. The lead investors will apparently be China's state-backed Silk Road Fund and display maker TPK from Taiwan. In exchange for the investment, the group will take a 30-50% stake in Japan Display.

Samsung Display to review its QD-OLED investment plan on April

According to reports, Samsung Display will hold an investment review committee on April 2019 to decide whether to go ahead with plans to start producing QD-OLED TV panels. If the plan is approved, Samsung will start installing production equipment towards the end of 2019, with mass production starting by the end of 2020 or early 2021.

QD-OLED stack scheme (DSCC, Oct-2018)

According to earlier reports, Samsung aimed to start pilot production of QD-OLED TV panels in 2019. It's not clear whether the new reports suggest a delay or whether they only refer to the mass production step, with pilot production proceeding as planned.

Samsung reports its Q4 2018 financial results - lower OLED revenues, demand will pick up in H2 2019

Samsung Electronics reported its financial results for Q4 2018, with revenues of KRW 59.27 trillion ($53 billion USD), down 10% from Q4 2017. Samsung's operating profit of KRW 10.8 trillion ($9.6 billion) was down 29% from 2017.

Samsung Display reported a decline in rigid smartphone OLED display sales - due to rising competition from LCD panels. Demand for flexible OLEDs was strong. In Q1 2019, OLED display sales will remain weak - but Samsung says that flexible OLED demand will pickup in the second half of 2019.

InZiv raises $2.5 million to develop next-generation OLED inspection tools

Israeli-based InZiv announced that it has successfully closed a Series A round, raising $2.5 million from Maverick Ventures Israel.

Using proprietary technology, InZiv designs and manufactures inspection equipment based on highly specialized nano-scale optics and near-field microscopy. InZiv's equipment is specifically designed to test next-generation display - such as OLEDs, Micro-LEDs and QLEDs. InZiv says that its nano-optical and metrological inspection equipment offers the ability to study a wide variety of defects not detectable with existing tools.

BOE announces plans for its fourth flexible OLED line, in Fuzhou, Fujian

Earlier this month we reported that BOE started to construct its 3rd 6-Gen flexible AMOLED production line in Chongqing's Liangjiang district (the B12 line). The Chongqing line will join BOE's first flexible 6-Gen OLED fab in Chengdu (the B7) and its second line in Mianyang.

BOE now announced plans for another large investment in a new flexible OLED fab, this one in Fuzhou, Fujian. This fab will be similar to BOE's other fabs - a 6-Gen (1500×1850 mm) line with a capacity of 48,000 substrates. The investment will total 46.5 billion Yuan (about $6.75 billion USD). This fourth line will bring BOE's total flexible OLED capacity to 192,000 monthly substrates.

DSCC: OLED equipment spending to rebound in 2020, but decline again in 2021

DSCC says that Q3 2018 was a record quarter for display equipment spending, as sales reached $7.8 billion billion in the quarter - up 13% from Q3 2017. In the quarter five new 6-Gen OLED lines were installed in addition to a 10.5-Gen LCD fab.The top 5 equipment vendors, according to DSCC, were Canon (13.1%), Applied materials (9.6%), Tokyo Electron, Nikon and SFA Engineering.

Despite the record quarter, total display spending will fall 9% in 2018 (to $21.6 billion). OLED equipment spending is expected to drop 44% in 2019 to $7 billion as mobile OLED spending slows. DSCC says that OLED spending will rebound in 2020, and will increase by 50% to reach $10.5 billion. In 2021, DSCC sees OLED spending declining again, and then rebound in 2022.

More details emerge on Samsung's QD-OLED TV Plans

Samsung Display is developing hybrid QD-OLED TV technology, and according to estimates, the company aims to begin trial production in 2019. It seems that Samsung is managing to overcome the technical challenges and the company is preparing to start production of such QD-OLED TVs in 2019.

QD-OLED stack scheme (DSCC, Oct-2018)

Last month Digitimes updated about Samsung's plans to start installing equipment by the end of 2018 and begin trial production in H2 2019. Digitimes now posted another article, revealing more details on Samsung's plans.

CSoT breaks ground on its upcoming T7 fab, which includes a printed OLED TV line

China-based display maker CSoT held a ceremony yesterday as it started construction on its upcoming T7 large-area display production fab. The T7 fab, which has a total cost of around 42.7 billion Yuan ($6.15 billion USD), will produce both LCD and OLED display.

Total capacity in the T7 line will be 105,000 monthly substrates (according to our information, the OLED capacity will be 20,000 monthly substartes). The T7 OLED line will use IGZO backplanes and inkjet printing deposition. CSoT's plan is to start production by the end of 2020 - with real mass production starting in 2021.

eMagin reported its financial results for Q3 2018

OLED microdisplay maker eMagin reported its financial results for Q3 2018. eMagin said it had another strong quarter supported by growth in its military with several new program wins and in its commercial business. Total revenues were $6.9 million (a 60% increase from Q3 2017), and operating loss was $1.3 million (down from $3 million in Q3 2018). Including a non-cash change in value of warrants, the company had a small net profit in the quarter.

eMagin SXGA OLED-XL microdisplay photo

Regarding its consumer business, eMagin updates that it has achieved design approval from one of its Tier-1 consumer electronics partners. eMagin's foundry partner will produce wafer for display prototypes for this customer. eMagin says that its direct-emission OLED microdisplays meets the wide field of view, no screen door effect and high brightness that the partner requires.

MagnaChip reports another quarter with high OLED driver revenues

MagnaChip announced its Q3 2018 financial results -with revenues of $206 million, and an operating income of $18.3 million. MagnaChip's OLED display drive revenues reached $58.3 (up 232.2% from Q3 2017) and are on track to set a revenue record in 2018 (MagnaChip best ever OLED year was in 2016 with $161 million in revenues).

During the quarter, six smartphones with MagnaChip's OLED drivers were launched (as expected) and the company continued to win several new designs for smartphones in Asia.