Samsung to discontinue LCD production in June, six months earlier than expected

[midian182]

In a nutshell: Samsung Display has reportedly decided to close its liquid-crystal display business in June. While that's six months sooner than expected, the company originally planned the shuttering for the end of 2020, but the pandemic and a surge in demand for consumer electronics saw it put those plans on hold.

The Korea Times writes that the decision to expedite the business' closure comes as consumer interest in LCDs falters in favor of display technologies such as Quantum Dot and OLED. The losses due to falling LCD prices have also played a major part. US market research firm Display Supply Chain Consultants (DSCC) reports that the LCD panel price index has crashed since late 2021 and is down around 60% year-on-year.

Another factor has been Samsung Electronics—the largest buyer of Samsung Display products—partnering with overseas LCD suppliers from China and Taiwan. The switching from LCDs to OLEDs for smartphones in recent years has also been an influence.

It was Samsung Electronics that requested the display affiliate pause plans for closing the LCD business in 2020 following a spike in LCD prices as the Covid pandemic peaked.

Employees at the LCD arm are expected to be relocated to Samsung's QD and OLED divisions following the transition.

We recently heard about Samsung's Quantum Dot technology being combined with an OLED panel to create the MSI MEG 342C monitor. The same combo is used in the Alienware AW3423DW, which we love and awarded a score of 90 in our review. It's also found in the Samsung Odyssey G8QNB.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/94767-samsung-discontinue-lcd-production-june-six-months-earlier.html

 

[Avro Arrow]

"Another factor has been Samsung Electronics—the largest buyer of Samsung Display products—partnering with overseas LCD suppliers from China and Taiwan."

Fifty bucks says that this is the principle reason for the closure and the rest is BS.

 

[Dimitriid]

This is troubling: it feels like companies are intentionally killing perfectly viable technologies as soon as they become easier to produce and can be mass manufactured to avoid them becoming really accessible to people: It's far harder for Samsung to manipulate the supply of LCD panels and henceforth, fix their prices to create intentional scarcity than it is for them to do the same thing with say, OLED and AMOLED displays: 90% of people don't really *need* an OLED display for stuff like computer use which is very widespread in laptops in the business segment for example.

Yet now that they won't even produce LED displays like, at all, we can expect the mid term future (Next 3 to 5 years) to have a big demand surge while displays command outrageous prices and most of the world now has to pay outrageous sums for laptops and monitors since all of them are OLED or mini-led, none of them are cheap and most of them are spoken for so your laptop is back at being 2000-3000 bucks if you can even find one and most corporations will begrudgingly just pay whatever the price is to keep doing business

 

[Burty117]

I've got the Samsung S95b QD-OLED TV and pretty impressed with it. Colours pop, it's bright and man, so so thin.

My only gripes are software related which it sounds like they've fixed with updates. They just haven't pushed the update out to the UK yet.

 

[yRaz]

"Another factor has been Samsung Electronics—the largest buyer of Samsung Display products—partnering with overseas LCD suppliers from China and Taiwan."

Fifty bucks says that this is the principle reason for the closure and the rest is BS.

I'd like to know what type of LCD panels because it's my understanding that QLED panels are just supped up VA panels. And, to the best of my knowledge, VA is a type of LCD. So are Samsung going all in on QD-OLED or....what, I really don't know. While I absolutely love OLED as a tech, I have a use case that would actually encourage burn in and try to avoid them. I know burn in isn't so much of an issue anymore, but dimming and what I call "browning" of the display is still an issue.

For some reason it seems like older OLEDs start to get a brown tint. This could very well have been fixed but I'm not paying OLED prices to find out.

 

[bviktor]

What a misleading article. "Quantum dot" is supplementary tech both for LCD and OLED. ALL current quantum dot TVs are LCD, so statements like "they stop LCD manufacturing in favor of quantum dot" makes no sense whatsoever.

No. They stop LCD manufacturing in favor of OLED. QD is just added (optional) spice, it doesn't change the underlying tech.

In any case, they need to speed up microLED. OLED is a dead end.

 

[Geralt]

I'd like to know what type of LCD panels because it's my understanding that QLED panels are just supped up VA panels. And, to the best of my knowledge, VA is a type of LCD. So are Samsung going all in on QD-OLED or....what, I really don't know. While I absolutely love OLED as a tech, I have a use case that would actually encourage burn in and try to avoid them. I know burn in isn't so much of an issue anymore, but dimming and what I call "browning" of the display is still an issue.

For some reason it seems like older OLEDs start to get a brown tint. This could very well have been fixed but I'm not paying OLED prices to find out.

The old OLE technology was sh***. Hence the brown tint.

 

[Burty117]

Yeah I gotta say, this article is a bit confusing. LCD covers their entire product range except for a single product (S95b) so are Samsung about to stop making all their TV's?

Or are we talking about a subset of LCD screens are going to stop being produced, most likely TN panels?

 

[wiyosaya]

What a misleading article. "Quantum dot" is supplementary tech both for LCD and OLED. ALL current quantum dot TVs are LCD, so statements like "they stop LCD manufacturing in favor of quantum dot" makes no sense whatsoever.

To be fair, Samsung is manufacturing QD-OLED panels/TVs. https://www.samsung.com/us/televisi...ass-s95b-oled-4k-smart-tv-2022-qn65s95bafxza/

 

[wiyosaya]

Yeah I gotta say, this article is a bit confusing. LCD covers their entire product range except for a single product (S95b) so are Samsung about to stop making all their TV's?

To be clear, the S95B line is QD-OLED, not QD-LCD.

To me, it sounds like the article is implying that they will stop manufacturing LCD panels, whether QD or not, and just manufacture QD-OLED panels, however, I do not get, from the article, that Samsung will stop manufacturing TVs.

I have not seen the Samsung QD-OLED panels in person, but I have seen LGs OLEDs next to Samsung QD-LCD panels, and, IMO, the LG OLEDs blow away the Samsung QD-LCD panels in all respects. My guess is that the QD-OLED yields along with the drastic increase in picture quality is the main reason behind this move - other than profit, of course.

 

[Burty117]

To be clear, the S95B line is QD-OLED, not QD-LCD.

Yep, I own one and I did state "except for a single product (S95b)"

To me, it sounds like the article is implying that they will stop manufacturing LCD panels, whether QD or not, and just manufacture QD-OLED panels, however, I do not get, from the article, that Samsung will stop manufacturing TVs.

I was being facetious, them stopping production of LCD panels is 99% of their entire product range.

I have not seen the Samsung QD-OLED panels in person, but I have seen LGs OLEDs next to Samsung QD-LCD panels, and, IMO, the LG OLEDs blow away the Samsung QD-LCD panels in all respects. My guess is that the QD-OLED yields along with the drastic increase in picture quality is the main reason behind this move - other than profit, of course.

QD-OLED is even better than OLED, I wouldn't say it's night and day difference but definitely noticeable. It fixes some of OLED's drawbacks with no downsides, picture quality wise, the S95b is the best TV I've had. Software wise Samsung need to step up their game, the menu's are terrible.

 

[p51d007]

Marketing...the advertising makes it seem that you will see more, do more, experience more with
an OLED display. Same as a faster processor, more gigabit internet, and on and on.
More is better LOL.
I know when I got my first smartphone that has 90-120 Hz display, I slowed it down to 60 hz, and
showed my friends how "fast and smooth the 120 hz was. Then, I told them it was set on 60, showed them, and then turned it up to 120 hz. They couldn't tell the difference.
In other words, 99% of the people would never know unless you told them.
Yeah, if you are a pixel peeper, gamer, benchmark person you'll see a difference, but the majority of people couldn't tell the difference same as they couldn't tell how much faster the version 2 gen 8 chips versus the older chips are.

This is troubling: it feels like companies are intentionally killing perfectly viable technologies as soon as they become easier to produce and can be mass manufactured to avoid them becoming really accessible to people: It's far harder for Samsung to manipulate the supply of LCD panels and henceforth, fix their prices to create intentional scarcity than it is for them to do the same thing with say, OLED and AMOLED displays: 90% of people don't really *need* an OLED display for stuff like computer use which is very widespread in laptops in the business segment for example.

Yet now that they won't even produce LED displays like, at all, we can expect the mid term future (Next 3 to 5 years) to have a big demand surge while displays command outrageous prices and most of the world now has to pay outrageous sums for laptops and monitors since all of them are OLED or mini-led, none of them are cheap and most of them are spoken for so your laptop is back at being 2000-3000 bucks if you can even find one and most corporations will begrudgingly just pay whatever the price is to keep doing business

 

[wiyosaya]

QD-OLED is even better than OLED, I wouldn't say it's night and day difference but definitely noticeable. It fixes some of OLED's drawbacks with no downsides, picture quality wise, the S95b is the best TV I've had. Software wise Samsung need to step up their game, the menu's are terrible.

I've heard QD-OLED is better; for one, it is supposed to be less susceptible to burn-in. I'll have my eye on them. OLED sets, QD or otherwise, are finally getting into the price range where I am willing to buy one.

 

[Adhmuz]

Reading through the comments it feels as if the article was misread by the majority.

"Samsung Display has reportedly decided to close its liquid-crystal display business"

Samsung Displays is only ceasing production of traditional LCD panels because:

"Samsung Electronics—the largest buyer of Samsung Display products—partnering with overseas LCD suppliers from China and Taiwan"

In other words, Samsung Electronics is still going to manufacture LCD TVs, they just won't be making the panels at their subsidiary plant Samsung Displays any longer and instead source them from lower cost suppliers. Expect some budget class Samsung LCD TVs or at least the price to come down to remain competitive in the ultra budget class LCD TVs.

Meanwhile Samsung Displays will continue to, and likely focus, manufacturing on QD and OLED panels going forward, hopefully allow the price of these to also come down on future models.

 

[bandit8623]

This is troubling: it feels like companies are intentionally killing perfectly viable technologies as soon as they become easier to produce and can be mass manufactured to avoid them becoming really accessible to people: It's far harder for Samsung to manipulate the supply of LCD panels and henceforth, fix their prices to create intentional scarcity than it is for them to do the same thing with say, OLED and AMOLED displays: 90% of people don't really *need* an OLED display for stuff like computer use which is very widespread in laptops in the business segment for example.

Yet now that they won't even produce LED displays like, at all, we can expect the mid term future (Next 3 to 5 years) to have a big demand surge while displays command outrageous prices and most of the world now has to pay outrageous sums for laptops and monitors since all of them are OLED or mini-led, none of them are cheap and most of them are spoken for so your laptop is back at being 2000-3000 bucks if you can even find one and most corporations will begrudgingly just pay whatever the price is to keep doing business

lets be honest. lcd still even to this day has been garbage compared to crt's for movement quality. oled is the only way forward. yes for the non techy people who dont care lcd is fine...

 

[Dimitriid]

lets be honest. lcd still even to this day has been garbage compared to crt's for movement quality. oled is the only way forward. yes for the non techy people who dont care lcd is fine...

I specifically mentioned office work precisely *because* you don't need any kind of movement quality to look at spreadsheets and emails all day every day so that's one of the most popular use cases that exist today still that have 0 benefit from this very argument.

So excuse me but throwing a gamer argument I specifically preempted shows me how much you're not paying attention and only hyper focus on the tech you want personally and try to apply it as if it was universally useful.

 

[bandit8623]

I specifically mentioned office work precisely *because* you don't need any kind of movement quality to look at spreadsheets and emails all day every day so that's one of the most popular use cases that exist today still that have 0 benefit from this very argument.

So excuse me but throwing a gamer argument I specifically preempted shows me how much you're not paying attention and only hyper focus on the tech you want personally and try to apply it as if it was universally useful.

Yikes... Offended much?

I wasn't attacking you at all. But you sure are upset lcd will eventually go away.

As will all tech things move along. Look at plasma also very good image quality but not around. Oled can also match your productivity needs as well.

 

[Burty117]

I specifically mentioned office work precisely *because* you don't need any kind of movement quality to look at spreadsheets and emails all day every day so that's one of the most popular use cases that exist today still that have 0 benefit from this very argument.

So excuse me but throwing a gamer argument I specifically preempted shows me how much you're not paying attention and only hyper focus on the tech you want personally and try to apply it as if it was universally useful.

I disagree with that, I work on a computer all day long and a low quality LCD screen can give me a headache. It's the inability to actually turn off pixels, the low quality rubbish you see in most offices, blacks aren't black but more of a bright grey a lot of the time.

An OLED screen would legitimately help me when it comes to headaches as dark modes will actually work properly.

 

[wiyosaya]

lets be honest. lcd still even to this day has been garbage compared to crt's for movement quality. oled is the only way forward. yes for the non techy people who dont care lcd is fine...

I agree CRT, because its emissive, is theoretically better, but I personally do not know of any CRT monitors still available in the marketplace.

Personally, I think microled will be the way to go when they become affordable. Microled is both brighter than OLED and has no burn-in issues at all.