As a 90-year-old, the author first contacted the computer in the third and fourth grades of elementary school. At that time, the computer's real thing was a luxury product. The big-headed CRT monitor looked a little cute, and Windows 98 was the latest system. The most memorable thing is that when you queue up in the engine room, you have to buy a shoe cover. There are even two computers. You can open a black Internet cafe. The male students in the class go back and play for an hour or two after school. They have to wait in line.
Nowadays, computers are just a 'tool' in our daily life work. Like televisions and refrigerators, they have become one of the necessary appliances for every household. Computers have been reduced in price to popularization because of technological development and the maturity of production lines. On the other hand, of course, it is because of the improvement of people's material living standards.
As an important part of computer equipment, displays have also undergone earth-shaking changes for more than two decades. The core technology has changed from CRT to LCD; the screen ratio has changed from 4:3 to 16:9, or even 21:9. The resolution has been upgraded from 720P to 4K/8K; the size has also changed from the early dozens of inches to the current dozens of inches; the most important thing is that the price has also changed from the luxury that the consumers can't expect. Cabbage price'.
In the years from 2000 to 2005, that is, in the years just after the rise of LCDs, the prices of mainstream consumer products were basically between RMB 2,000 and RMB 5,000. Now, at this price, we can buy more than 27 inches. 2K/4K high-end display, or even an extremely professional e-sports monitor. At that time, a few thousand dollars and a few thousand dollars now is what kind of concept, I believe I do not have to explain too much!
Now, we open an e-commerce website or go to offline stores. The price of an ordinary 30-inch large-screen display of a mainstream brand can be as low as 1,000 yuan or so. It can be said that the thousand-dollar display occupies the current The vast majority of the market share. From 'luxury' to 'cabbage', what has China's display market experienced in these 20 years?
The reason why the monitor was 'luxury' in the past
In fact, when computers were just popular in the early days, the monitor’s high price was well understood. Although the technology at that time was not as advanced as it is now, it was much harder than it is now. Many of the world’s manufacturers were able to produce, and their productivity was low. Things are rare and valuable, therefore, more than ten years ago the computer can be regarded as a well-deserved luxury.
Judging from the upstream market of monitors, since the computer began to enter the consumer market, the Chinese panel market has been in a state of “losing the core” for a long period of time. It has long depended on imports. At that time, China was the world’s largest LCD consumer market. Ironically At the same time, it is also the largest liquid crystal import market. Even in China's annual import material consumption rankings, the LCD panel is second only to oil, iron ore, and chips, and ranks fourth.
Until ten years ago, due to the lack of patented technology for a long time, the products we produce on our own cannot achieve the trust of consumers and have no advantage in terms of price or performance. As a result, the panel market in China has always been difficult to rise. , And totally dependent on imported products, the price of course goes against the tide. The once-for-all foreign garbage that was once eliminated abroad has been regarded as an example for our consumers.
In addition, there were only a few display manufacturers at that time, once formed a monopoly, and the head merchant controlled the market. Even if the lowest-end LCD products enter the Chinese market, they can set a 'good price'! For consumers, of course, No matter how angry or uncomfortable, you have to accept it. After all, the market is such a market. At that time, there was no purchasing service or sea scouring.
To sum up, in the past, the monitor 'luxury' was the following:
Low technical difficulty, high productivity, and rare materials
China's upstream panel market 'core lack screen'
Head businesses manipulate the market to form a monopoly
The reason why the monitor 'cabbage' is now
History wheel rolling forward, the current LCD display market is not only very rich in product, the price is also very favorable, the market differentiation of high school and low-end products is obvious, product breakdown is also in place, e-sports, public practical, design drawing, commercial office. .. and other types, fully able to meet the needs of every consumer.
Similarly, from the development of upstream panel manufacturers, China has made breakthroughs in the panel industry in the past decade, that is, the 2008-2018 decade. It has achieved a leading position from scratch. In the first half of 2017, China's display industry's total industry sales revenue reached 135.6 billion yuan, an increase of 65% year-on-year. Domestic panel shipments reached a total of 31.82 million square meters, accounting for 33% of the world's total.
In particular, BOE, the global market share has continued to increase. The market share of smartphone LCD screens, tablet PC screens, and notebook PC screens has reached the number one in the world, and the display screens have been promoted to the second highest in the world. TV LCD screens are maintained. The third in the world. And this year, BOE's world's first 10.5-generation TFT-LCD production line in Hefei began mass production. The strength should not be underestimated.
According to relevant data from IHS, China is expected to become the world's largest flat panel display production region in 2018, accounting for 35% of the global market. At the same time, BOE has surpassed South Korea’s LG Corp. by becoming a global player with 22.3% global shipments. Display panel business first. The world's top five panel supply companies, respectively, are BOE (22.3%), LG (21.6%), AU Optronics (16.4%), Innolux (15.7%) And Samsung panel (accounting for 9.9%).
China's self-developed panel has matured, bid farewell to the past era of 'core lacking screen', increased production capacity, lower display manufacturer's product cost reduction, natural feedback to consumers is a low price.
In addition, the display industry has seen rapid development of new technologies, and emerging display technologies such as OLED, QLED, Micro LED, and graphene have become the main theme for upstream vendor research, and they have been used in mobile phones, televisions and other fields like OLEDs and QLEDs. It will not be too late to commercialize the display on the inside. It can be said that the emergence of new technologies has also given rise to a reduction in the price of LCD monitors.
From the brand point of view, the large and small brands on the market are very rich. Although the market has stabilized, new brands are still entering. The advantages of some well-known international brands are no longer evident, and the competition among brands is intensifying. For consumers, there are more, better choices.
With many brands and more natural products, liquid crystal technology has experienced ceilings after more than 20 years of development. In addition to increasing resolution and increasing size, manufacturers seem to have no other tricks to play, and one has increased. A performance feature, other competing products will immediately follow, product homogeneity has been very severe, of course, can only rely on price war to compete.
To sum up, the reason why the display 'cabbage' now has the following points:
China's upstream panel makers mature
The emergence of new technology has led to lower prices of LCD
Brand product homogeneity, increased competition
To lag behind, we must master the right to speak
From the monitor's technological progress and price changes over the past 20 years, we can fully understand the impact of the upstream panel market on the display industry. We can now enjoy a diversified display device at a relatively low price, without Chinese display. The rise of the market, behind more is the support of the panel manufacturers, which benefits the downstream companies.
For example, some emerging elements in the display market, e-sports monitors with high refresh rate above 144Hz, curved display for 1800R, super-widescreen display for 32:9, larger and larger screen size, and HDR technology, 4K/8K high resolution Rate technology, etc., on the one hand, are inseparable from the screen technology support.
The emergence of China's display industry is also a manifestation of the overall economic strength of the country. In the above, we also mentioned that panel makers in the mainland have been working hard to improve the status of 'core-less screens'.
From the perspective of resources, there are abundant domestic funds, localization of materials supply chain and localization, completeness of infrastructure and supporting facilities, and full guarantee of human resources at all levels. From the demand side, China's display terminal factories account for the demand for screens. The overall global demand exceeds 50%, and there is a huge market demand.
In the future, the display industry in China will continue to maintain its position as a frontrunner, and it will also need continuous independent innovation. Objectively speaking, although we have continued to improve over the years, we still have some technology, patents, talents, etc., and Korean panel makers. The gap is therefore more in need of input, innovation, building a complete ecosystem, etc.
After all, 'backwards must be beaten' This sentence is applicable in any era.
