Huawei and Xiaomi use BOE OLED screens. Who will have the last laugh in the China-Korea competition?

　　On October 26, 2017, BOE  announced the mass production of its Chengdu flexible AM ​​OLED 6th generation line, which is China's first fully flexible AM ​​OLED production line and the world's second mass-produced 6th generation flexible AM ​​OLED line. It broke Samsung's absolute monopoly in this market and also allowed domestic mobile phones to use domestic OLED screens. Does BOE 's early mass production mean that the Sino-Korean display panel war has entered a new stage? Who will have the last laugh in the new round of competition in the panel industry? Let's follow the mobile phone portable editor to learn about the relevant content.

Huawei and Xiaomi use BOE OLED screens. Who will have the last laugh in the China-Korea competition?

　　It is understood that the total investment of BOE 's B7 Chengdu 6th generation AMOLED line in mass production this time is 46.5 billion, with a designed capacity of 48,000 per month. The production line adopts the most advanced half-cut evaporation in the industry, the same as Samsung, and cuts the glass substrate into half for evaporation, which is very technically difficult. At the same time, low-temperature polycrystalline silicon (LTPS) plastic substrates are used instead of traditional amorphous silicon (a-Si) glass substrates, and flexible packaging technology is used to achieve bending and folding of the display screen. BOE's customers at the B7 factory include more than ten manufacturers such as Huawei, OPPO, VIVO, Xiaomi, ZTE, and Nubia. In addition, in addition to the flexible OLED screen with a thickness of only 0.03 mm, the factory also has the same special-shaped cutting "bangs screen" as the iPhoneX. Its technology and process improvements have exceeded industry expectations, proving that BOE has the ability to provide Apple with flexible OLED screens.

　　Why can BOE break Samsung's absolute monopoly?

　　One of the important reasons why BOE has achieved today's results is that it seized the opportunity and made early arrangements. The two recessions in the panel industry before 2000 made Korean and Taiwanese companies successful. After 2000, during the new recession, Chinese companies seized the opportunity to invest heavily in the panel industry. As the leader of China's display industry, BOE has 12 production lines since the first 5th generation line was put into production in 2005, of which 3 are under construction, with a total investment of 359.2 billion yuan.

　　In addition, this round of panel boom is not only the beginning of a new round of cyclical fluctuations, but also the beginning of the switch from OLED to LCD. The most intuitive thing is that more and more flagship phones are migrating from LTPS to flexible OLED. BOE has always liked to take the lead in layout. In 2017, it launched two 10.5-generation lines and two 6-generation flexible OLED lines at the same time, using the method of company investment + bank loans + local government equity to leverage tens of billions of assets with billions of funds.

　　Of course, besides production capacity, R&D investment cannot be ignored. BOE's 2017 semi-annual report shows that R&D investment in the first half of the year reached 3.17 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 63%, accounting for 7.1% of total revenue, an increase of one percentage point from 6% in 2016, exceeding Apple's 4.6% R&D investment in 2016 and approaching Samsung's 7.7%. In the 2017 Global Innovation Report released by Clarivate Analytics in September, BOE ranked as the world's third largest innovative company in the semiconductor field in 2016, second only to Samsung and LG, and its 2,420 patents were second only to ZTE and Huawei among all Chinese companies. In the first half of 2017, BOE's new patent applications exceeded 4,000, and the cumulative number of patents in use has exceeded 55,000.

　　Therefore, early planning and using billions of funds to leverage tens of billions of assets, coupled with huge investment in research and development, are all important factors in BOE's impressive achievements in the process of switching from LCD to OLED.

　　Breaking Samsung's monopoly, China will become the region with the largest OLED production capacity outside of South Korea

　　In the new round of OLED competition, it is understood that Japanese companies were the first to develop OLED, but they decided to withdraw completely. Now Japan Display (JDI) and Sharp, which was acquired by Foxconn, are planning to re-launch the 6th generation OLED panel production line. Taiwan has also been following OLED, but has not yet supplied in bulk. Therefore, some industry analysts believe that the competition pattern of the global panel industry will evolve from the current "three countries and four places" (South Korea, Japan, mainland China, Taiwan) to "two powers (China and South Korea) competing for hegemony."

　　According to Geng Yi, Secretary General of the China OLED Industry Alliance, China's OLED production line construction has begun to take shape, gradually transitioning from technology research and development to large-scale production. In 2016, the total shipment of OLED panels in mainland China reached 6 million pieces. This time, BOE's Chengdu factory broke the Samsung monopoly and it was just the beginning of the direct competition between China's OLED panel army and South Korea. Other panel manufacturers in China are also speeding up the construction of OLED production lines in various places. Huaxing Optoelectronics is building a 6th generation flexible OLED production line in Wuhan; Hehui Optoelectronics' 6th generation OLED production line is in Shanghai; Shenzhen Tianma's 6th generation flexible OLED production line is also located in Wuhan; Visionox's 6th generation flexible OLED line is in Gu'an, Beijing.

　　According to Qunzhi Consulting, in 2017, the world added 4 new 6th generation flexible OLED production lines, including BOE Chengdu, LGD, and Tianma Wuhan (expected to be put into production in November-December 2017), and Samsung expanded one 6th generation flexible OLED line. From 2018 to 2020, the world will add 12 small and medium-sized OLED production lines, of which 6 are in mainland China. It can be seen that the increase in flexible OLED production capacity in the next few years will mainly come from Samsung and panel factories in mainland China. By 2020, mainland China will become the region with the largest OLED production capacity outside of South Korea.

　　Who will have the last laugh in the battle between China and South Korea?

　　Samsung Electronics of South Korea started to make OLED in about 2000 and started to make flexible OLED in 2005, and has accumulated more than 10 years of production process experience. We know that unlike the widely used LCD technology, OLED uses organic light-emitting materials, and the stability during the production process is not as high as that of inorganic materials. In the production process of small and medium-sized OLED screens, it is necessary to evaporate the red, green and blue OLED materials onto the panel, and improving the product yield is a great challenge. An important prerequisite for BOE's B7 factory to be able to mass-produce ahead of schedule this time is to get the Canon Tokki evaporation machine. As an indispensable equipment for OLED panel factories, the annual installed capacity of Canon Tokki evaporation machines is only four to five. Even with the active efforts of all parties, Canon Tokki only planned seven evaporation machines in 2017. In addition to evaporation machines, luminous materials are also subject to others. Therefore, the imperfection of the industrial chain, especially the weakness of the upstream links, restricts the development of Chinese panel companies.

　　In addition to the limitations of equipment and materials, compared with Korean companies, domestic AMOLED core technology is still backward, so quickly climbing production capacity and improving yields is still a major challenge. The backbone companies in China's panel industry chain also need to penetrate upstream material and equipment manufacturers through capital investment, joint development, and technical cooperation, so as to open up and improve the entire OLED industry chain as soon as possible and enhance competitiveness.

　　Finally, since the panel industry is a typical asset-heavy, strong cycle, it always fluctuates around the supply and demand cycle. Although the industry generally believes that there will not be an oversupply of OLED panels in the short term, the possible overcapacity in the future is also a big test for Chinese panel manufacturers. Fortunately, unlike other industries, when there is overcapacity and prices fall, latecomers can expand production capacity through counter-market investment, hit competitors, and become industry leaders, which gives great hope to Chinese manufacturers who are still lagging behind. But it is difficult for us to judge who will have the last laugh in the OLED panel war between China and South Korea. Time will give us the best answer.

    The above is an introduction to the mobile phone portable market - Huawei/Xiaomi use BOE OLED screens. Who will have the last laugh in the competition between China and South Korea? If you want to know more related information, please pay more attention to eeworld. eeworld Electronic Engineering will provide you with more complete, detailed and updated information.