Coretronic has upward adjusted forecast growth in 2021 shipments for LED backlight units (BLUs) from 20% originally to 25-30%, according to president Sarah Lin for the company's Display Business Group.
High-tech supply chains are encountering the availabilities of different chips that are in varying degrees. Chips such as display driver ICs (DDI) are no longer in tight supply, prompting suppliers of such chips to cut back wafer starts at foundries, according to industry sources.
Apple is showing its preference for miniLED backlighting for high-end notebooks and tablets, and Apple is likely to adopt such backlighting for 13.3-inch MacBook Air to be launched in 2022, according to industry sources.
Local governments' restricting power supply in China has led to decreases in utilization of production capacities at LCD panel supply chain makers' factories mostly in southern and eastern China to about 60%, and consequently, output of panel components and LCD modules has dropped by about 30%, according to AVC Revo.
The car industry has been plagued by component shortages, and automotive IC shortages are likely to last till at least 2023. TSMC's plan to build a mature process fab in Japan comes as good news for a semiconductor sector yearning for more capacity supply. And PanelSemi CEO Ting Chin-lung is making efforts to materialize his concept of "panel semiconductor."
Chinese panel makers have become the world's largest LCD makers after over a decade of fierce market competition, while South Korean panel makers have chosen to gradually withdraw from the LCD market and turn their attention to OLED.
Coretronic expects October shipments for projectors and image devices to decrease about 20% sequentially and those for LED backlight units (BLUs) to slightly decline, according to the company.
Taiwan-based display driver IC (DDI) backend specialists expect to post flat sequential revenue growth in the fourth quarter of 2021, as tight foundry capacity constrains their fabless clients' output, according to industry sources.
Touch solution provider TPK Holding has said its plants in southeastern China will cope with local governments' restrictions on power supply by adjusting production schedules and inventories, and expects operation of these factories to be slightly affected by the restrictions.
Apex International, a Thailand-based PCB maker established by Taiwanese entrepreneurs, has received booming orders for PCBs used in miniLED backlight units (BLU) from Samsung Electronics, according to industry sources.
LED packaging service provider Everlight Electronics will begin shipping miniLED backlight units (BLU) for automotive central information displays and dashboards in small volumes to makers in the supply chains of US and European automakers in fourth-quarter 2021, according to the company.
LCD panel prices will likely continue trending downward until the end of the first quarter or the beginning of the second quarter in 2022, according to industry sources in China.
LED lighting maker Tons Lightology has obtained orders with shipments scheduled until several months after but has had shipments deferred due to congested logistics operations at many harbors around the world and shortage of containers, according to the company.
Flexible AMOLED + On Cell display design is adopted for 5.4-inch iPhone 13 mini, 6.1-inch iPhone 13, 6.1-inch iPhone 13 Pro and 6.7-inch iPhone 13 Pro Max, according to industry sources.
Shenzhen Laibao Hi-Tech, a China-based maker of ITO conductive glass, color filters as well as OGM (one glass metal mesh) and OGS (one glass solution) touch panels, will step into the production of LCD modules with an investment of CNY250 million (US$38.5 million) to set up a factory in Chengdu, western China, according to industry sources.
Some Taiwan-based LCD driver IC suppliers have claimed their book-to-bill ratios remain above one with clear order visibility through the end of this year and even 2022, in response to recent reports indicating LCD panel prices have started falling due to a slowdown in TV and other end-market device demand.
Corning has appointed Andrew Ho as president of Corning Display Technologies Taiwan (CDTT), replacing Daniel Tseng, who has been named president and general manager of Corning Display Technologies China.
Light guide plate maker Global Lighting Technologies (GLT) has obtained orders with shipments scheduled until fourth-quarter 2021 as originally expected, according to company president Johnny Tsai.
Coretronic saw consolidated revenues of NT$4.137 billion (US$148 million) for August increase 2.92% on month and 6.11% on year and those of NT$29.831 billion for January-August grow 12.09% on year.
Optical film maker Wah Hong Industrial has reported consolidated revenues of NT$938.1 million (US$33.7 million) for August, slightly increasing 1.16% sequentially but decreasing 3.87% on year, and those of NT$7.228 billion for January-August grew 10.67% on year.
Taiwan recorded a total export value of US$39.55 for August 2021, hitting a monthly record for the second consecutive time with a growth of 4.2% on month and 26.9% on year. The corresponding total import value of US$36.08 billion was also the historically highest monthly figure and rose 12.6% on month and 46.3% on year, according to the Ministry of Finance (MOF).
