In March, the laser display once again sent good news: Hisense Video's "Ultra-high-definition Ultra-short Throw Laser Display Technology Research and Development and Application" project recently won the first prize of the Shandong Provincial Science and Technology Progress Award. This represents that the "market" recognition of 4K laser display technology represented by Hisense laser TV products has once again been "refueled". The industry trend of laser display will also increase again!
New display technology continues to be created, why laser display can "reduce dimensionality strike"
At present, the display industry is entering a "big tide period" of innovation. Including OLED display technology, mini LED backlit TV technology, microLED display technology and other new products emerge in an endless stream. However, compared with these product technologies, laser TVs have an unprecedented "dimensionality reduction" advantage.
First of all, whether it is OLED TV, mini LED backlit TV, or traditional LCD TV, the essence is flat panel display technology. The biggest bottleneck is that "the glass substrate limits the large size of the product".
For example, the mini LED backlit TV (referred to as the mini LED TV) that has been on fire since last year, although it uses the mini LED chip instead of the traditional LED backlight, has obtained a great improvement in display effect. However, "from dozens, up to hundreds of LED lamp beads, to a few thousand, more than 20,000 or 30,000 LED lamp beads", such a large complexity increase, but can not change the "inherent bottleneck" of liquid crystal display technology: including reaction speed, pure black performance, display size bottleneck, etc.
Second, the micro LED display, that is, the use of micro LED lamp bead devices, directly build a three-primary color large-screen display system technology. This new display solution can overcome many bottlenecks in the display area of traditional flat panel displays. With the help of micro-level LED crystal particles, it is also enough to achieve a "small enough" pixel size and extremely high resolution. However, this technology requires the support of LED lamp beads "huge transfer" technology. The transfer and welding of more than 30 million LED lamp beads on a 4K display screen is not an easy task, but also a high-cost thing.
The use of the latest technology LED display as a popular large-screen display application solution, will inevitably face the "cost" difficulty. Industry insiders pointed out that micro LED direct display products are currently the display technology with the highest cost per unit display area. Even if the cost of products in the future is greatly reduced, it is difficult to compete with traditional liquid crystal flat panels or emerging laser display technologies.
Compared with the above new display technology, the advantages of laser display are: 1. small equipment, large screen - handheld portable equipment can also achieve 100-inch large-screen display; 2. large screen, low cost - mainstream laser TV, the price of 100-inch giant screen has dropped to about 10,000 yuan, and there may be 40% room for decline in the future; 3. Low cost, high performance - three-color laser is currently the only display technology that can economically achieve 100% coverage of the next generation of film gamut DCI-P3 standard; 4. High performance, more eye protection - The use of imitation image technology, and cinema large-screen imaging technology homologous, better viewing comfort.
It is precisely these advantages that make the laser display technology that was born soon be able to win the favor of many consumers and customers in the differentiated markets such as large-scale cultural and entertainment activities such as the Winter Olympics, home large-screen color TVs, and business education multimedia displays, which constitutes a "dimensionality reduction blow" to traditional display technology categories. It is also because of the "value advantage" of laser display technology, with the support of deep research and development background, Hisense ultra-high-definition ultra-short throw laser display system can once again win the honor of "first prize of provincial science and technology progress award".
Upward infinitely, the laser display is ushering in the "main" growth cycle
According to DATA FROM RUNTO, the Chinese mainland laser display (including laser TV) market shipments in 2021 were 597,000 units, up 41.8% year-on-year.
Among them, the display market is known as the "highest unit price" of the engineering display field, laser display products in 2021 shipments of 121,000 units, an increase of 179.2%; the display field demand for the first household market, laser display products in 2021 the volume of 343,000 units, an increase of 50.8%; especially in the second half of 2021 only began to supply the bulk of household laser micro-investment products, the market size in less than half a year to achieve "after the annualization" of more than 100,000 units of scale growth, It is a growth miracle that has never been seen in the new product line of the display industry.
The industry predicts that in 2022, the Chinese mainland laser display will exceed 1 million units, an increase of more than 75% year-on-year. Laser display is crossing the "cultivation period" of the early market and entering the "main growth period" of market demand: the main features of this period are not only the rapid growth of sales, but also the further maturity of the industrial chain and the further decline in product costs.
In terms of growth, laser display will mainly achieve "richer" innovation on the supply side. For example, the first appearance of laser light source ultra-short focus micro projection in 2021, laser conventional focal length micro projection products, and engineering model applications with a brightness of more than 60,000+. Especially in the field of high-brightness micro-projection, the advantages of laser light sources are increasingly being shown: the advent of 500-1000 stream brightness products with a weight of 300-500 grams and pocket models has completely solved the "visual performance problems" and "battery-powered endurance problems" of "ultra-portable, embedded and mobile" large-screen displays, which will drive the acceleration of this display demand segment in the future.
At the same time, three primary color laser display technology, curlable laser display solutions, and 8K laser display technology have increasingly entered the "marketization stage". These disruptive innovations will also greatly enrich the market supply of laser display, provide accurate and differentiated solutions in more market segments, and be conducive to the rapid and high-quality development of the laser display industry.
The maturity of the industrial chain and the decline in costs will also be the biggest change in the "main" incremental period of laser display entering the market. Industry experts pointed out that the establishment of a strong supply chain system is the premise of the decline in the cost of laser display products; and the market demand with a certain scale is the basis for the industry to establish a strong industrial chain supply system. The sales scale and growth rate of laser display products in 2021 have provided "fuller" confidence for the development of the industry chain.
According to the White Paper on China's Laser TV Industry, the Laser TV Industry Branch of the China Video Industry Association, in the past 20 years, the number of patent applications in the field of laser TV in Chinese mainland has exceeded overseas, becoming the largest in the world. Among them, on behalf of the enterprise Hisense, public information shows that as of February 2022, it has applied for 1634 domestic and foreign patents in the field of laser display, authorized 695, and authorized 64 foreign patents, continuing to lead the global laser TV industry innovation. On December 7, 2021, the incoPat Innovation Index Research Center, a global intellectual property comprehensive information service provider, and IPRdaily Chinese Network jointly released the "Laser Display Technology Patent Ranking (TOP100)", and the mainland brands Hisense, Guangfeng Technology and Seemicroku ranked in the leading position, and the number of patents was far ahead.
In addition to technological leadership, mainland enterprises have also made continuous breakthroughs in the manufacture of core components upstream of laser display in recent years. For example, Sanan Optoelectronics, the world's largest company in semiconductor electro-optical conversion devices, deputy general manager Zhang Zhongying said in mid-2021 that Sanan has been carrying out trial production of Blu-ray LD3.5W, Sanan is expected to achieve mass production of Blu-ray LD4.0W in Q4 2021, and it is expected to achieve trial production of red LD1.5W in Q1 2022. As the localization breakthrough of the laser display core light source chip, it will greatly promote the development of the laser display local industry chain. For example, in 2020, Guangfeng and other enterprises broke through the mass production of local laser display supporting "high-level optical anti-light curtain", and pioneered a new category of "flexible optical anti-light curtain", which provides unprecedented assistance for curlable laser display.
The industry expects that at present, the laser display industry, lasers, optical engines and other core devices localization rate is not high, about 50%. This proportion is eager to rise to more than 75% in the next three years. With the increase in the proportion of the local industrial chain, the overall cost of laser display is also eager to decline. In the next three years, the cost of laser display may be reduced by about 40% on the basis of further improvement in performance. This will further benefit the rapid development of the laser display market.
In summary, the award of Hisense's "ultra-high-definition ultra-short-throw laser display technology research and development and application" project is just another "footnote" to the vigorous development of the laser display industry. As a representative of a new generation of display technology, laser display is using continuous technology and product innovation to provide the market with more and more inexpensive and high-quality "shocking big screen" visual experience.