Industry news

Panasonic on November 28 announced that it has developed LCD panels with a contrast of one million-to-one and display quality equivalent to that of OLED panels. Panasonic will begin sampling in January 2017 and start production of 10- to 100-inch models specifically for use in medical care and automotive displays in the third quarter.

After phasing out from plasma TV panel production in 2013 and LCD TV panel production in 2016, Panasonic no longer has panel products for B2C sales and its only panel production plants in Japan currently only supply panels for B2B applications with a utilization rate of 25%.

With the new panel technology, the company is expected to be able to manufacture using its existing production lines and will be able to avoid costs from investing in new OLED production lines.