April 26, 2024

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[THE INVESTOR] Samsung Display, the unparalleled leader in smartphone OLED market, is trying to expand its foothold in the laptop and automotive markets with its up-to-date technology.

The company recently launched the world’s first 15.6-inch UHD OLED display for laptops which offers extremely high-resolution, outstanding contrast, and great outdoor visibility, all of which are optimal features for gaming, graphic design, and video streaming, according to the Korean display maker.

Samsung Display’s 15.6-inch UHD OLED display for laptops. Samsung Display

The new OLED laptop screen can get as dim as 0.0005 nits while it can also get as bright as 600 nits. Compared to traditional LCD peers, black colors are 200 times darker while white colors are twice as bright. The OLED display also offers a spectrum of 3.4 million colors, two times higher than LCD displays, the company explained.

The 15.6-inch panel is expected to be used in the laptops of major players in the field although Samsung did not specify the names of its partners.

Beyond the IT segment, the display firm is also setting its eyes on the automotive market. After the supply of its 5.7-inch OLED display, as a control panel in the backseat, for luxury car maker Audi in 2017, it also provided the carmaker with a 7-inch OLED display for “virtual exterior mirrors,”’ for electric car e-tron in September 2019. The side-view mirrors, equipped with exterior cameras, shows the surroundings of the car through a pair of OLED displays installed inside the vehicle.

The OLED display, among other advantages, works in harsh conditions, like low temperature; boasts fast response time; and shows deep black and bright white colors.

These technical advantages have helped the display maker secure more partnerships recently.

Car maker Audi’s ‘virtual exterior mirror,’ a digital side-view mirror utilizing Samsung Display’s OLED panel. Samsung Display

Earlier this month, the firm launched a 12.3-inch OLED dashboard, which shows driving information, including speed and fuel gauge as well as music and navigation, in partnership with Samsung Electronics and its subsidiary automotive parts maker Harman.

“Samsung Display, which has led the smartphone display market with innovative products, aims to reach out to a broader range of customers by making inroads into the laptop and car industries,” a company official said.

Its market share in the mobile OLED segment accounted for 92 percent of the entire market in 2018, according to market research firm IHS Markit. The overall OLED market is forecast to grow from US$22 billion in 2018 to US$35.2 billion in 2023.

By Kim Young-won (wone0102@heraldcorp.com)