LG will stop making LCD screens. What will happen to your Smart TVs?
Surprising movement in the Smart TV sector. Mainly, because LG has just announced that it will stop manufacturing LCD screens. In this way, the historic manufacturer is withdrawing from a market that it has dominated for years.
As reported by Kedglobal, a highly reliable Korean portal, LG Display, the subsidiary of LG Electronics will finally dismantle its LCD panel factories in China and Korea.
The reason? It is no longer profitable to manufacture this type of panels. The entry of Chinese manufacturers such as BOE, whose production costs are significantly lower compared to LG Display, have forced the iconic Korean company to withdraw from the market.
What will happen to Smart TVs with LG LCD technology?
Keep in mind that we are talking about totally different businesses. You may not know but LG Display is the subsidiary of LG Electronics and that is responsible for manufacturing screens for LG itself or other manufacturers.
And, seeing that manufacturing costs are reaching unaffordable levels, the Korean company has made the decision to adapt the technology they use to make LCD screens for televisions.
As indicated by the Korean media, the company intends to adapt its current plants in China so that continue to manufacture LCD panels, but in a small format and that are oriented to the automotive sector, phones, tablets and other markets.
So what will happen to LG LCD Smart TVs? You can be very calm, because the manufacturer will continue to sell LCD and OLED models. The only difference is that, until now, LG Electronics used the panels manufactured by LG Display, and now they will bet on an external supplier.
Currently, BOE is the largest manufacturer of LCD screens in the worldso it will surely be this Chinese company that will provide LCD screens to LG Electronics for its catalog of smart televisions.
“We will close the LCD TV panel business for local use in Korea no later than the end of 2023,” LG Display CFO Kim Sung-hyun said during a Q2 2020 financial results call. .
LG’s idea is to produce 60,000 units in the remainder of the year and reduce production to 30,000 units in the first quarter of 2023 before completely shut down the production of this type of screens in the second half of next year. In this way, although it will continue to sell LCD televisions, it will leave the manufacture of the screens in the hands of external suppliers.
