Taiwan makers' small- to medium-size panel shipments reached 329.7 million in the third quarter of 2014, down 6.2% on quarter and 12.8% on year, according to Digitimes Research.
The on-year decrease is largely attributed to increased efforts from China, Korea and Japan panel makers to secure orders from China vendors coupled with the vendors' less-than-expected results due to a slowdown in the China handset market. The vendors' inventories also piled up due to lagging demand for 4G handsets.
However, the makers' overall proportion of handset panel shipments rose 2.1pp to hold a 77.4% share as demand for other applications was undermined by that for smartphones.
In terms of tablet panels, low-priced units in particular saw a 10.2% sequential increase despite limited overall shipments as vendors put in increased orders to compete against low-priced notebooks.
The makers' production proportion of LTPS TFT LCD applications during the third quarter meanwhile dropped 0.5pp as makers have yet to expand production for smartphone applications coupled with rising competition from outside makers, added Digitimes Research.
This article is an excerpt from a Digitimes Research Quarterly Data Report (Taiwan small- to mid-size LCD panels – 3Q 2014). Visit our latest Data reports.