Analysis - China to See Rivalry between LCD TV And PDP TV

07.19.05, 1:02 PM ET Asia Pulse Pte Ltd BEIJING, July 19 Asia Pulse - Recent years saw an upsurge of demand for FPD TV sets in China. Experts anticipate that LCD TV and PDP TV - two main categories of products of FPD TV - will divide up the domestic FPD TV market with their respective technical and cost features. The year 2005 will have a market demand for 1.85 million sets of FPD TV in China, 185 per cent higher than 2004. It is also expected that in the third quarter consumers to purchase LCD TV will account for 69.5 per cent as against 30.5 per cent favoring PDP TV, partly because consumers are more familiar with LCD TV, according to studies made by Research Institute of Market Economy under the Development Research Center of the State Council and China Electronic Chamber of Commerce. But according to experts, LCD TV and PDP TV have respective advantages over each other. As for integrated performance, PDP shows better outcome with its 6 excellent indexes of all 12 main indexes, in which indexes of luminance contrast, brightness and color are better than those of LCD panel and minimum response time of PDP is 1 millisecond, compared to 10 milliseconds of LCD panel. In terms of service life, LCD TV manifests longer hours (60000hrs) than PDP TV (30000hrs). But new PDP TV of 2005 is also expected to be able to reach service life of 60000 hrs. LCD TV consumes power that is 30 per cent less than that of PDP TV, although both consuming above 200W. Analysis of cost for LCD TV and PDP TV shows that display panel occupies above 65 per cent of material cost, which determines prices of TV sets. Present cost of over-40-inch PDP is 50 per cent-55 per cent of cost of LCD, estimating 70 per cent-75 per cent of LCD cost in 2008. As for 40-inch display panel, PDP costs 25-US$30 per inch as against LCD panels cost of US$60 per inch. Manufacturers see the promising future of FPD TV markets and are expanding their production in 2005. In 2005, PDP manufacturers will have five new factories put into production, expanding their production capacity by 50 per cent, or 72 million units in new annual output. In the meanwhile, average price of PDP TV is expected to drop 20 per cent along with improving technology and developed new materials. LCD will also expand production this year by establishing five 6-generation factories (mainly focusing on production of 32-37 inch display panels) and one 7-generation factory, and it is anticipated that in 2007 and 2008 more 7.5-generation and 8-generation factories will attend the race. It is expected with one more year of adaptation to the market after 2008, 40-inch LCD TV will have the same cost as PDP TV. Therefore, the year 2009 will be a hot year for LCD and PDP to race to seize the FPD TV market. Data from CINO show that LCD and PDP will keep high growth in recent years in which PDP will dominate over-40-inch display panel market with market share rising from 32 per cent in 2004 to 49 per cent in 2008, due to descending price and improving technology; LCD, having few over-40-inch products, will dominate 20-37 inch display panel market with market share rising to 21 per cent by 2008 along with production from 7-generation and above 7-generation factories. (XIC)