LG Display will stop producing LCD TV panels in south Korea

According to the Nikkei, LCD display maker, LG Display, announced that it will stop producing LCD panels for televisions in South Korea. According to reports, LG Display will close its production line in Paju, South Korea, within the year. The reason is that “the market situation of LCD panels has deteriorated due to increased production by Chinese companies, and it is difficult to improve the profit and loss situation.”

LG Display’s Guangzhou plant (China) will continue to produce LCD panels for televisions. Earlier, there were reports that LG will close one of its two LCD plants in South Korea.

LG Display’s Guangzhou factory started construction in July 2017 and officially started production in August 2019. The total investment of the project is up to 46 billion yuan. It covers an area of more than 190,000 square meters with a total construction area of 560,000 square meters. The main plant has 9 stories above ground. LG Display holds 70% of the shares, and Guangzhou High-tech Zone Technology Holdings Group Co., Ltd. holds 30%.

With the latest development, LG no longer has any LCD TV production bases in South Korea. In October last year, LG stated that it plans to “reduce” its two LCD TV panel production lines in South Korea. In the third quarter of last year, LCD TV business accounted for 32% of LG’s revenue, down from 41% in the previous quarter. This is mainly due to the decrease in shipments of LCD TV panels. Between January and October last year, LG Display lost money for three consecutive quarters. However, CEO Jeong Ho-Young said that the company’s performance is expected to “further improve” in the second half of this year.

While terminating the South Korean LCD TV production, LG Display’s goal is to shift its focus to organic light-emitting diode (OLED) technology. LG Display expects that new technologies will account for 50% of the company’s revenue by 2021, up from about 30% in 2018.

Jeong Ho-Young said, “We plan to set up a system to mass-produce OLED products at our Chinese factory by the end of the first quarter of this year.” He also said that LG Display does not intend to use Korean LCD TV production lines for OLED panel production.

Meanwhile, LG’s rival Samsung Display said last October that it had suspended one of its LCD production lines in South Korea. In addition, Samsung Display also announced that it will invest 13.1 trillion won (approximately $11.25 billion) to upgrade its production lines.