LG, which has been associated with Samsung and the Korean doubles, has entered the downtrend channel in recent years. At present, almost all of the electronic and electrical businesses of LG Electronics have been squeezed out of the mainstream Chinese market, and some businesses have appeared in local markets. , but basically at the stage of no one cares.
The author believes that LG, once known as the 'selling foreign-funded foreign brand', has gradually been marginalized by the market. In this case, LG can only be on its most comprehensive industry chain competitive TV business. Force, give it a go, expect to rely on the TV business to pull back the momentum and return to the brand's glory moment. And the fact is really what LG expects?
Turning losses into profits, LG wants to reshape the brand highs
As it turns out, LG's strategic adjustment has indeed begun to pay off. The data shows that as its current core business of TV business, LG realized the company's turnaround in the second half of 2017. According to LG's third quarter report for 2017 Show: In the quarter, LG's operating profit reached 516 billion won (about 454 million US dollars), an increase of 82.2%, which is the highest point of profit growth since LG was exposed to losses in 2016. As the second only after Samsung Electronics The second-largest TV manufacturer, LG Electronics, turned losses into profit, making the industry see the hope of the LG brand renaissance.
The industry also unanimously believes that LG's eye-catching performance is largely attributed to the strong sales of the TV business. Taste the sweetness brought by the TV business, LG strategy continues to maintain the strong sales momentum of the TV business, and continues to win beneficial.
According to data released by LG officially, LG achieved revenue of 61.4 trillion won (about 57.45 billion US dollars) for the whole year of 2017, a year-on-year increase of 10.9%, and operating profit of 2.47 trillion won (about 2.31 billion US dollars). 85%, the highest profit since 2009. Although in the performance statement, the business income is not broken down, but in the case of other business sales are not ideal or even loss, we can be sure that LG's performance surged with its TV Close business relationship.
In fact, for LG, the benefits brought by the TV business are still continuing. The data shows that in the first quarter of 2018, LG's operating profit increased by 20.2% year-on-year to reach 1.1078 trillion won (about 6.5 billion yuan). ), the chain surged by 202.0%, which is even called the 'profit surprise' by the securities industry.
According to industry forecasts, thanks to a series of major sports events on the agenda this year, such as the World Cup in Russia, the performance of LG TV is expected to continue to improve. It can be said that many favorable factors in 2018 also give LG TV business. Brought the 'dongfeng' of the market.
In a good situation, LG continues to increase the number of TV business. With TV business as the focus of business, LG saw the hope of reshaping the brand's high point.
The advantage of LG TV business is overtaken?
Although LG's performance is not bad, the author's in-depth research found that the overall market situation of LG TV business is not optimistic. It can be seen from the 'LG Electronics Official Report' chart that although LG's operating income is slowly rising, operating profit fluctuates greatly. The main reason for this phenomenon is that LG has shifted its focus to the OLED sector. Its profitability mostly depends on the market conditions of OLED panels. The advantages of traditional LCD TV services are being overtaken, and the market share is not rising.
We know that LG TV business is divided into two major sections: LCD and OLED TV. At the beginning of this year, LG also updated two TV product lines of OLED and Super UHD LCD. LG official said that it will further strengthen the high-end TV business, which is expected In 2018, LG's OLED TVs will account for about 20% of the company's overall TV sales. We see that although LG will focus on OLED TV as the development of TV business, LCD TVs account for more than 80% of the business, still The main force of LG TV business. In other words, LG is still relying on LCD TV (LCD) to support the scene.
According to data released by IDC, as early as the fourth quarter of 2016, Chinese brand BOE surpassed LG in the large-size LCD panel market to become the first. Due to this influence, LG TV panel shipments declined and showed negative growth. Similarly, LG TV market share also showed negative growth. In 2016, LG TV shipments fell by 4.1%, which is the biggest decline among the top 5 color TV sets.
According to statistics from Zhongyi Kang, in January 2017, LG TV retail sales have faded out of the top 10. In addition, according to the color TV monitoring data of Zhongyikang 2018 Week 25 (6.18-6.24), LG TV offline retail sales On the online basis, LG TV retail sales bottomed out and became the 'weak' in all brand camps.
In the Chinese market, LG TV is also being marginalized. Sales are not far less than the domestic brands such as Hisense, Skyworth, and even lose the advantage compared with Samsung, Sharp and Sony, which are also foreign brands. From Zhongyikang 618 color wire As can be seen from the monitoring data, the share of LG TV is not even as good as the Internet TV brand that has accelerated the shrinking and KKTV.
Is it really wise to force the OLED business?
In the TV business structure, LG has been adding OLED TV business. LG's brand 'LG Display' is the world's only mass-produced OLED TV panel manufacturer, and it also announced in May this year that it decided to increase the production capacity of OLED TV panels. After mass production of LG Display Paju G10.5 and Guangzhou G8.5 OLED production line, it is expected that the sales proportion of its OLED business will expand to 40% by 2020.
According to the data, in the first quarter of 2018, the overall sales of global OLED TVs, although LG ranked first in the market with a 70% market advantage, but in my opinion, LG will focus on high-end home appliances OLED TV, not Wise move.
First of all, the price of OLED TVs is still high. The cost of OLED TV panels is 3-4 times that of LCD TV panels, which makes the price of OLED TVs much higher than traditional LCD TVs. At present, higher positioning limits Consumers of OLED TV.
For example, the price of a 55-inch OLED TV is about 10,000 yuan, and the price of a 65-inch is about 20,000 to 30,000 yuan. Although the quality is excellent, the high price makes the popularity of OLED TV difficult. According to Zhong Yikang 2018 The 25-week color TV monitoring data shows that although the retail volume of OLED TVs increased by more than 4 times during the 618 period, the overall sales volume of OLED TVs accounted for only 0.2%, which also indicates that OLED TVs cannot be accepted immediately by the public.
Secondly, at present, the OLED TV market is not big. According to the latest survey, OLED TV sales in the global market account for only about 1%. Although OLED is widely regarded as the ideal technology for next-generation display, it still needs to be popularized. Certain time. This point determines that LG will not be able to rely on the OLED TV business to hit the market high point in the short term. At least in 2-3 years, the full popularity of OLED TV is not realistic, and now LG is fully committed to OLED TV, can it last for 2 years or Unknown.
Finally, OLED TVs are high-end products and cannot be fully concerned by the mass consumer market in the short term. From the perspective of development strategies, major TV manufacturers have not taken it as the focus of TV business. Even Samsung Electronics currently does not target OLEDs. I am optimistic that OLED technology is still immature and cannot be mass-produced, bypassing the OLED TV business; while Japanese brands such as Sony and Sharp adopt positive marketing methods to take pre-position. In contrast, LG not only focuses on OLED as a business focus, but also invests heavily. Even losing the traditional LCD TV advantage (LCD) for this, it is very radical.
Written at the end
The author believes that OLED TV still belongs to the niche market, although the prospects are promising, but from the current point of view, its low cost performance industry is short-term, which determines that OLED TV is difficult to become a TV industry trump card in the short term.
In fact, in recent years, LG TV business has been struggling on the profit and loss line: In the third quarter of 2016, because consumers are not enthusiastic about ultra-thin OLED TVs, LG lost 60 billion won ($53 million). Although it achieved positive in 2017. Growth, but also to a certain extent, LG is currently enjoying the dividends released by OLED TVs, and this is not necessarily sustainable. Now, LG is so desperate, once the OLED market changes, LG TV will completely withdraw The stage of history.