06
Sep
2006
AME Info: LG Electronics will remain committed to both LCD and plasma television technology, which will continue to dominate the flat screen TV market for years ahead.
Speaking yesterday, LG President and Chief Technology Officer Dr. H.G. Lee said plasma would keep a 15-20% cost advantage over LCD but that LCD would increasingly challenge plasma in the key 42-inch screen market.
06
Sep
2006
Reuters: Hitachi said on Tuesday it expects prices of its plasma display TVs to fall by about 20 percent in the business year to next March.
Hitachi Vice President Makoto Ebata told reporters he expects strong sales of plasma TVs of more than 40 inches, which are less threatened by competition from LCD TV makers that tend to be strongest in screens smaller than 40 inches.
“Panels are getting bigger and demand for high-definition plasma TVs is strengthening,” Ebata said at a new flat panel factory in Miyazaki, southwestern Japan. “We are aimimg for 30 percent of the global market for high-definition plasma TVs.”
Hitachi was the world’s fifth-largest seller of plasma display TVs in 2005.
05
Sep
2006
New research shows that consumers in Europe favour plasma screens over LCD screens in side-by-side tests. The research by market-research firm Synovate was commissioned by Panasonic and Pioneer and surveyed consumers in France, Germany and the UK.
Claimed to be the first authoritative analysis of how consumers rate the two technologies, respondents were asked to enter a ‘comparison suite’, where a range of un-branded plasma and LCD TVs displayed the same content. The participants were then asked a series of questions based on the image performance of the displays, including characteristics such as contrast, black tone, resolution, colour and response speed performance.
Top-line conclusions showed that consumers believe that plasma provides the best quality viewing experience in comparison to LCD.
More importantly, opinions among those who had some prior knowledge of the two technologies swung dramatically toward plasma once they had viewed the content side-by-side.
According to the research, plasma screens are deemed to be superior to LCD across all of the image categories. 63% of respondents marked that plasma provided the best quality for sharpness, compared to 21% for LCD.
The full research report is here.
Panasonic make both LCD and plasma screens, whereas Pioneer make Plasma screens and TVs.
01
Sep
2006
Reuters UK: LG Electronics and Sharp Corp. said at IFA (Berlin) yesterday that they expected prices of flat LCD television sets to drop by at least 20-30 percent in 2007 amid overproduction and cost reductions.
“Last year we saw about 30 percent of price reductions for plasma and a little bit more for LCD. In 2007, we expect about the same,” Young Chan Kim, head of global marketing for LG’s displays division told journalists.
Katsuhiko Machida, president of Sharp, said he expected a fall closer to 20 percent on average for LCD TVs.
Machida said low-resolution TV sets with screen sizes of 40 inches and above might suffer a 30-percent fall in prices.
“But for full-specification, high-resolution sets – due to limited supply compared with demand – we don’t see that big a drop,” he added.
LG reiterated its goal to become the world’s No. 1 display company by 2007. It is currently the second-biggest plasma television producer.
Machida said Sharp expected to regain market share – which it began losing a year ago because it had insufficient capacity to meet demand – from October, when Sharp will start selling LCD TVs made with panels from its new plant in Kameyama, Japan.
30
Aug
2006
China Post: Ahead of Europe’s largest consumer electronics trade fair, IFA, reports are surfacing that flat panel TVs are possibly getting too big for the living room. German consumer magazine Test counsels against watching high-definition television from closer than three times the screen diagonal size, or else viewers may notice lines in the picture.
That would mean placing armchairs at least 3.2 meters from a 42- inch screen, further than some smaller living rooms allow.
In Germany, Europe’s biggest market, the standard size that most shoppers currently choose is the 32-inch, but all signs are pointing to the 42-inch becoming the norm.
29
Aug
2006
AV Interactive: Hitachi is to launch it’s latest range of high resolution plasma panels at this week’s IFA show in Berlin, including a ‘world-first’ 42-inch Alis 1024 x 1080 resolution plasma, as well as a 60in 1920 x 1080 display.
The company is also launching its PictureMaster 9000 ‘iDTV’ series – 32in and 37in LCD panels, and 42in and 55in plasmas – as well as their ’8000 Series’ HD-ready LCD and plasma TVs.
25
Aug
2006
DigiTimes: Worldwide plasma shipments rose 95% on year to 2.2 million units in the second quarter of 2006. Plasma screens now hold 5% of worldwide TV shipments, according to DisplaySearch.
Panasonic was the top plasma brand for at least eighth consecutive quarters. Its share surged from 22% to 28% by growing more than 70% in shipments, which was nearly three times faster than any other top five PDP TV brands.
PDP TV revenues increased with a more modest 23% on quarter and 57% on year to US$4.9 billion last quarter, as the range of price reduction outpaced that of the increase in average size. PDP TVs accounted for 20% of the global TV revenues, up from 18% in the first quarter of 2006.
North America overtook Europe and became the top region in PDP TV shipments for the first time on stronger demand for larger-size models, resulting in a 32-34% share advantage. North America dominated the 50-inch PDP TV market, accounting for 63% of all 50-inch PDP TVs sold worldwide in the second quarter of 2006.
By size, the 42-43-inch category remained dominant although the share of the segment fell from 78% to 73% on gains by 37- and 50-inch PDP TVs.
Global Top 5 Plasma Suppliers: Unit Share and Growth, 2Q06
1. Panasonic: 28.3%
2. LGE: 17.1%
3. Samsung: 13.6%
4. Philips/Magnavox: 10.3%
5. Hitachi: 7.4%
6. Others: 23.2%
Source: DisplaySearch, August 2006.
25
Aug
2006
EDA Geek: Less than a quarter of the world’s population will own a flat panel TV by the end of this year, according to a global survey from market research firm IDC. This paints a bright picture for the industry.
Consumers say high quality video is the main force driving demand for digital TVs. Over half of IDC survey respondents consider high definition (HD) compatibility as an extremely important factor influencing their decision to replace their current TV.
Surprisingly, a majority of respondents say they do not currently subscribe to HD programming.
Pricing is also a significant issue. In fact, TV price concerns towered over all others on the list including display technology, screen size, and even brand. “Cost is critical in my decision,” writes one survey respondent. “I know what I want, but am waiting until the price suits me.” More than 60% of respondents (all who fell into a high income demographic) say they expect to pay less than $2,000 (around 1,500 Euro) on their new TV.
While price points have dropped over the years, they remain somewhat high for a large part of the TV-buying public.
24
Aug
2006
eHDMI.com: The latest plasma screens from Fujitsu – the 55-inch P55XTS55 and 63-inch P65XHA51 have just hit the shelves.
With 1366 x 768 resolution, there’s only one HDMI port among the usual bevy of connectivity options. The screens retail at just over 8,000 Euro for the 55-inch or 13,000 for the 63-inch version.
07
Aug
2006
Engadget: Sony is finally getting serious about quitting the low-profit (for them, at least) world of plasma — and it would appear they’ve finally done it.
Sony has been seeing a sharp decline in shipments, from 300,000 in 2004 to 100,000 in 2005, and profits have been slim due to the lack of their own plasma display factories. They plan to increase LCD shipments to pick up the slack, and hope to increase their shipment ratio of 40-inch plus LCDs by 50% before year’s end.
They’ve also contracted construction on an eighth-generation LCD plant, which should start production in fall 2007, and handle 50,000 glass substrates a month. Sony hopes to boost LCD sales 33% in 2007 to a whopping eight million units, and if it means bigger displays and lower prices we sure won’t be complaining.
03
Aug
2006
AV Zombie: After a period of restructuring and re-focussing, Pioneer posted a dramatic 20.4 percent gain in revenue and an operating income of 191,676 million yen for its first financial quarter, ended June 30.
The improvement was down to growing interest in its European and North American plasma business as well as accelerating car audio and sat nav revenues.
Sales in its Home Electronics division increased 32 percent year-on-year to 83,451 million yen, with plasma displays accounting for 47 per cent of the revenue.
Pioneer’s operating loss in this segment was 397 million yen, which is a significant improvement compared with its operating loss of 12,358 million yen in the corresponding period last year.
11
Jul
2006
The new president of Matsushita Electric Industrial, 60-year old Fumio Ohtsubo, said in his inauguration speech in Japanthat he hopes to boost the annual sales of Panasonic’s plasma screens by a massive 70 percent, to one trillion yen; as well as increase revenue from semiconductor chips to 650 billion yen a year; boost revenue from its car electronics division to one trillion yen (from 690 billion in the last fiscal year) and home appliances to 3 trillion yen (from 2.5 trillion yen).
Ohtsubo replaces Kunio Nakamura, now chairman of the board, who won kudos for the way he has reversed the company’s perilous finances, from a record loss of nearly 200 billion yen in 2002 to a 400 billion yen profit in 2005.
It’s all part of a change of focus away from restructuring. “My mission as president,” he says, “is to make a phase change toward growth. Unless we achieve higher levels of success in flat TVs, car electronics, home appliance and semiconductor businesses where our strength already lies, we can not evolve into a globally excellent company.” A business plan and timetable to achieve this growth will be presented in January 2008.
Ohtsubo also said he’s aiming for a 5 per cent operating profit margin in the financial year ending March 2007, doubling to 10 percent by 2010. “If we can meet this operating margin target, we can be seen as a globally excellent company,” he proclaimed.
Source: AV zombie