Small Automotive Displays Show Promising Future Amid Skidding Car Sales
2009/05/08 | By Quincy LiangBucking the trend of nose-diving car sales worldwide amid the global recession, the small/medium-sized (smaller-than-10-inch) automotive display market remains one of the fastest-growing segments in terms of both shipments and revenue.
The winner of such promising forecast from Taiwan is AU Optronics Corp. (AUO), the largest thin film transistor (TFT)-LCD panel manufacturer on the island, which is expected to command a 10% global share to become the No. 3 player in the automotive application market.
Chris Crotty, DisplaySearch's director of small & medium displays research, said that despite automobile production in North America having declined 59.5% year-on-year (YoY) in January, a sign of the seriously worsening global economy, display-centric automotive electronics would continue to grow over the long term. The major growth momentum from such growing market, he said, would come from applications as navigation devices, as well as rear-seat and in-console panel monitors, which are becoming increasingly popular.
Two Key Segments
According to DisplaySeach, the automotive display market has two key segments: automotive monitors used for in-console navigation, controls and rear-seat entertainment, as well as other-typically smaller-displays used as indicators, dials and gauges. With the demand for displaying information and entertainment increasing, and with automakers searching for profitable features, automotive monitors are the major growth momentum in this market.
The research firm forecasts that sales of automotive monitors will grow from 16.6 million units in 2009 to 34.4 million units by 2015, with revenues of US$1.03 billion in 2009 rising to US$1.56 billion by 2015. The growth for automotive monitors is being driven by the demand for in-console displays for navigation and other operations.
DisplaySearch also forecasts that 7.0-inch panels for automotive monitors will gain the most unit share during 2009-2015 with an increase from 40.5% to 46.2%. In addition, such product will also gain the most revenue share during the same period, with an increase from 45.7% to 52.2%. The growth in automotive monitors has weakened the demand for portable navigation devices, which the research firm forecasts will decline at a 3.9% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) from 2009 to 2015.
Automotive monitors are all active-matrix (AM) LCDs, dominated by amorphous silicon (a-Si) TFT technology, and are the largest-sized panels used in automobiles, with two-thirds of 2008 shipments larger than 6-inch. The dominant application for automotive monitors is navigation, DisplaySearch says, and the company forecasts that 41.1% of automotive monitors will have touch-screens in 2009.
Leaders
The automotive monitor supply base is dominated by two Japanese suppliers, Sharp and Toshiba Matsushita Display Technology Co., Ltd. (TMD), which together have accounted for two-thirds of the overall shipments in recent years. However, two other Japanese players, Optrex and Epson, have dramatically increased shipments in 2008. Automotive monitor suppliers sell their products to a relatively concentrated market, with Panasonic, Siemens/VDO, Pioneer, Fujitsu-TEN and Alpine having bought more than half of the units shipped in recent quarters.
