CORONAVIRUS COVID‐19 ROILS DISPLAY SUPPLY CHAIN
2020; Wiley; Volume: 36; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1002/msid.1097
ISSN2637-496X
Autores Tópico(s)COVID-19 Pandemic Impacts
ResumoTip of the Iceberg Deserted Wuhan streets in early February, as normal activities ground to a halt. WITH COVID-19 INFECTIONS REPORTED IN MORE THAN 100 countries by early March 2020, the health crisis' impact on the display manufacturing industry was being felt well beyond Wuhan, China, where the first cases of the illness were reported. Faced with a reduced workforce caused by travel bans and quarantine conditions, LCD and OLED fabrication plants (fabs) across China struggled to resume normal operations in early- to mid-February. Chinese LCD fabs were only expected to have a capacity utilization of 70 to 75 percent for the month compared to a normal rate of 90 to 95 percent, according to research from Omdia Display. That labor challenge was exacerbated further in mid-to-late February by bottlenecks in chemical materials and key components such as polarizers and printed circuit boards. “Those materials and component companies are facing the same situation—a shortage of labor, a shortage of logistics support, and the quarantine procedures,” says Omdia Display's Senior Director David Hsieh. The net result could be as much as a 40 to 50 percent drop in overall display production in China for February, he notes. The biggest impact is in LCD displays for TVs and notebook computers. By late 2019, the prolonged issue of LCD panel over-supply driven by Chinese fabs had begun to reverse course as Korean manufacturers restructured their capacity, shutting down some fabs and converting others to OLED production. According to Hsieh, concerns about an LCD panel supply going forward already had spurred some TV manufacturers to increase orders, and now that LCD production in China is slowing as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak, LCD panel makers are seeking sharp price increases from their original equipment manufacturer (OEM) customers, with a month-to-month jump of as much as 10 percent in some cases. Omdia had originally forecast that the price for an open-cell LCD TV panel was going to rise by $1 or $2 per month in February, but the actual increase may wind up being $3 to $5 for the month. “The problem is the coronavirus is coming so fast [that] the panel maker has been given a very good reason to increase the price radically,” Hsieh says. He also expects prices to increase for notebook displays, for which he predicts a 30–40 percent decrease in production for 2020's first financial quarter (Q1), because of shortages in LCD modules. While concerns over COVID-19 caused the cancellation of the Mobile World Congress (MWC) tradeshow in Barcelona, Spain, the near-term impact of the epidemic on smartphone display production appears to be minimal. Q1 production of smartphone displays is generally slow, notes Hsieh, with OEMs traditionally announcing new smartphone models at MWC, but not placing orders for displays until Q2 or Q3. And the bulk of OLED displays, which dominate the market for new high-end phones, also are made by Korean manufacturers such as Samsung Display. Last year, Korean fabs shipped 433 million smartphone displays, while China was at 54 million. Hsieh said initial targets for 2020 were 476 million smartphone OLEDs shipped from Korea and 128 million from China, which would more than double China's total from last year. Although the coronavirus will cause a “short-term setback” for Chinese smartphone OLED makers, he still has a target of more than 100 million Chinese OLEDs. In Wuhan itself, there are five major fabs, with four making smartphone displays. China Star and Tianma each operate a low-temperature polycrystalline silicon LCD fab and a flexible OLED fab in the city, while BOE has a new Gen 10.5 LCD plant aimed at TV panels. Hsieh says that the China Star and Tianma OLED fabs are both in the ramping-up stages, and the new BOE fab also is moving slowly. The biggest impact of COVID-19 in Wuhan may be on the China Star Gen 6 OLED plant. Along with BOE, it's slated to be a key supplier of flexible OLED panels for Lenovo's new Motorola Razr foldable phone. “It's unfortunate timing,” Hsieh says. —Glen Dickson The expected decrease in production for notebook displays in Q1 2020 because of shortages in LCD modules. Source: Omdia Displays APPLE IS CONSIDERING AN ALL-IN-ONE DESKTOP COMPUTER made from a single, curved piece of glass containing a display and a keyboard, according to a patent application recently published by the United States Patent and Trademark Office. In this patent application for an “electronic device with glass housing member,” Apple describes a device made from a continuous sheet of glass, plastic, or ceramic material that is “optically transmissive” and includes “a first portion defining a planar display area, a second portion defining a planar input area, and a curved portion between the planar display area and the planar input area.” Apple says “one or more display components” such as OLED or LED displays could be used to provide a graphical output, and that touch, force, or biometric sensors could be used to capture input. The company adds that the proposed desktop computer also could include a support structure attached to the glass sheet that would hold its processing unit and input/output (I/O) ports. “I haven't seen anything like that for a desktop format,” says Eric Virey, senior market and technology analyst for Yole Développement. “It's kind of unique because it's rigid and it's all embedded in one piece.” However, whether the device described in the application winds up being an actual product is another matter, says Virey, who notes that Apple was granted some 2,500 patents in 2019—the equivalent of seven a day. Indeed, although Apple frequently submits patent applications for product concepts, it doesn't always decide to commercialize them. Still, Virey says creating such a device is certainly feasible with existing display technology, and that LCD is a likely bet given cost considerations, perhaps in combination with bendable glass like Corning's new “ColdForm” Gorilla Glass. “With the kind of bending radius they're describing in this patent, you could imagine that LCD could do the job,” says Virey.— G.D. First Look Apple's all-in-one desktop concept. Image courtesy of Apple/USPTO
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