ANN/THE KOREA HERALD – While Samsung Electronics retained its top position as the leading television manufacturer in the first half of this year, Chinese competitors appear to be intensifying their efforts to narrow the gap.
Market tracker Counterpoint Research said on Monday that global television shipments grew in the April-June period for the first time in four quarters, fuelled by an Olympics spending spree.
It reached 56 million units in the second quarter this year, up three per cent on-year.
Samsung took the largest share of 15 per cent of total shipments, but it marked the company’s lowest quarterly record.
Chinese television supplier TCL came in number two with 11 per cent of the shipments share, while another Chinese firm, Hisense, followed with 10 per cent.
LG Electronics came in fourth with nine per cent.
As the Chinese rivals have been aggressively carving out their portion of the market, Korean firms have been strengthening their footing in the premium television sector, with larger screens and cutting-edge organic light-emitting diode display products.
During the same period, shipments of premium televisions jumped by 45 per cent on-year, also fuelled by the Olympics fever.
Samsung and LG topped shipments, gobbling up 33 per cent and 18 per cent. But their growth rates slowed compared to their Chinese runner-ups.
For Samsung, it was the first time that its share in the premium segment had dropped below 40 per cent. China’s Hisense and TCL took 18 per cent and 15 per cent.
Shipments of OLED televisions, in particular, grew 21 per cent on-year in the second quarter. LG was the unrivalled number one in the market, with 1.34 million shipments, or 53 per cent of the total share.
To widen the gap with the Chinese runner-ups, Korean companies are expected to continue to reinforce the OLED television line-ups, introducing new features involving artificial intelligence (AI) and form factors.
Underscoring how it topped the global television market, taking 28.8 per cent of market share by revenue, Samsung Electronics said yesterday it will stick to its sales strategy to focus on AI televisions, high-value-added televisions priced at over USD2,500 and large-screen televisions.
LG said it will maintain its leadership in the premium market with next-generation products with transparent screens, bendable screens and wireless televisions.
