According to various news reports from CES in Las Vegas - LG Display has decided to double the output of large OLED panels and will focus on securing new customers by continuously increasing production of small flexible OLED panels for smartphones.
Currently, LG Display is able to produce 34,000 Gen 8 sized OLED panels per month and is planning to increase this value to 60,000 per month during 2017 due to growing interest from an increasing customer base.
LG Display has been increasing number of its customers from LG Electronics in 2013, Skyworth, KONKA, and Changhong from China in 2014, Panasonic from Japan in 2015, and Phillips, GRUNDIG, Loewe, Metz, and VESEL from Europe in 2016 and is will start supplying OLED TV panels to SONY this year.
LG Display will also decide on final production focus of the P10 plant currently under construction in Paju. If LG Display decides to produce Gen-8 panels at this plant, competitive edge in production cost will be lower than Gen-10 panel when it produces large products with size of 60 inches or higher. If it decides to produce Gen-10 panels it will need to develop new production equipment. In this case, the amount of investments and risks will both increase. LG Display will decide on final details by end of June 2017.
LG Display will actively target Chinese customers whom it has not been paying much attention to lately and restore declining sales.
If the reports that Apple has decided to use Samsung Display's OLED panels for its next iPhones then it is safe to assume that sales of LG Display's small LCDs will decrease as a result.
Han Sang-beom, CEO (Vice-Chairman) at LG Display, is reported to have said:
- "We have huge expectations in increase in sales by having SONY, which has huge influence on TV markets, as our customer."
- "Because Apple has decided to use panels from our competitor, we predict that sales from our related businesses will decrease by one-third."
- "We are currently preparing to increase our production capability so that we can also supply our panels."
- "Output of OLED TV panels in 2017 will be 1.8 million which is twice as much as last year (900,000) and output of OLED TV panels in 2018 will be 2.8 million."
- "Our goal is to double this year’s sales from OLED TV panels from last year."
- "We have huge expectations in increase in sales by having SONY, which has huge influence on TV markets, as our customer."