Official 70"+ LCD thread - Page 46

In Irkuck's link they mentioned that:

Sharp, which recently announced its 2012 lineup, is now thinking about reconfiguring the plant to make panels with higher resolutions and other features during the slowdown.

I think that should be referring to the Kameyama 8G plant and not Sakai 10G.


Fact that they claim 10G is making 40" makes me doubt their understanding of what industry's definition of "equivalent" means.

Bottomline is that it is strange they would cut 10G production by half while ramping up 8G for iPad. It'll be a double whammy to their PnL. Unless of course they are confident that they can fully ramp 8G before the 10G cut.

Another possibility is operational efficiency. This means they ramp 10G to 100% (hypothetically) for 6 months and cut production for 6 months, resulting in 75% AVERAGE utilization. There are accounting, labour and inventory issue (already evident) in this strategy but not impossible. It would also help in reducing unit panel allocated cost ie why you can have incredibly cheap 70" & 80".

Nonetheless puzzling indeed.

By my crude math, the utilization of Sakai on 60" and 70" production alone is not remotely anywhere near 100%. Even if you assume they were selling some 60" panels to third parties, they can actually make something on the order of 5 million 70" panels per year (72,000 substrates per month x 6 panels per x 12 months). Yes, there are yield issues, but yields are probably quite high.

Given that last year's mix was very, very approximately 0.9 million x 60" and 0.3 million x 70", that's really a small fraction of capacity.

Chad B said that 735 is better than 732 because it has more options for calibration, and because of that the final PQ is better. It's somewhere in this thread a few pages back as far as I recall

No, Chad B's calibration report is in the official 735 owner's thread.

His review is here:

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...9#post21453089

His only comment about the comparison to the 732 is here, in that same thread: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showt...9#post21462339

Off the top of my head I think the 0.9m 60" global total unit sale doesn't sound right.

"On December 8, Kozo Takahashi, executive managing officer of Sharp, North and South America Group, said that it was thanks to the 60-inch LCD TVs that the company's sales have exceeded expectations. This year, the sales in US has reached 1.9 million units, which is almost a 40% growth compared to last year, and about 1.1 million of the total are 60-inch LCD TVs"

OK, so if the U.S. total for 60 inch was 1.1 million and they sold commodity panels to someone, let's just pretend they sold 1.8 million 60-inch panels total. (They didn't but let's pretend). Add in about 300,000 70-inch panels (which, honestly, is high... they offered a 60" for less than 1/2 the cheapest 70" for nearly the whole year and I really doubt the ratio of 60:70 was actually anywhere near as low as 4:1, but again let's pretend).

There is still a ridiculous amount more capacity than that at Sakai. It's less than one month making 70s. It's very approximately 4 months making 60s.

Something else is going on at Sakai and/or it has not yet reached even 50% of capacity.

I predict 1 trillion 70+ TVs this year alone.

IIRC analysts reports were they sold 3 (5?) mio 60" panels globally. As usual they didn't breakdown how many are quattron and non-quattron. i think Sakai only do Quattron

I think takahashi is talking about Sharp branded TV sets, and only in Americas... there's other regions to consider as well


You may find this meaningless but point is: if 10G sakai cannot be profitable soon, this thread will be closed as well.

^^ Most if not all analysts, expected Sharp to gradually rise above the other 2. That's why the stock collapsed 16% on the day. Yen strength is a major issue for all 3.

Snippets from CLSA 2 Feb:
"Most of our operating-profit cut also came out of the LCD and solar segments. We now anticipate significantly lower utilisation at Sakai and Kameyama No.2 LCD facilities for longer. We assume that Sharp’s solar profitability will continue to be inhibited by forex and a weak European market. Significantly, Sharp indicated that it will lower utilisation at its Sakai fab to 50% to bring down inventories, and it may take that opportunity to switch its 10G to costsaving IGZO process around 3QFY3/13. Sharp indicated the delay in its scheduled IGZO ramp at Kameyama No.2 but expects a complete conversion of the fab to IGZO by end of 3QFY3/13. IGZO shipments were delayed from December to February."

"there were some issues in making modules, which caused the delay"

From Sharp:
"A. TV business – The TV business entered a very severe downward trend in December and this is primarily due to weakness in the domestic TV business. We expect that, with the full-fledged shipment of IGZO starting from February, there will be no utilisation loss at Kameyama and that ASP will at least increase by 4-5 times, which will help improve fab profitability. The company is also planning to reallocate or cut personnel in the TV business and try to decrease its fixed costs by this coming spring."

So as I posted above, they have to assume G8 to ramp before G10 cut to make sense. And then it gets really weird:
"Q. The chart in the PowerPoint material (P14) suggests that the production cut in Sakai will continue until 2Q next fiscal year. The current inventory is equivalent to around 2.6 months of sales. What is the expected inventory level in 2Q assuming production cuts will continue till then? What is the expectation of demand?
A. We are expecting that inventory of 60” and 70” will be almost zero, assuming there is only demand for internal sales and no significant recovery in external sales till then"

ZERO inventory and cut G10 utilisation to 50%??? The inventory writedown was actually for G8 ie the money losing 60" that I have been talking about. Could it be G10 transition to IGZO or 4k? But I thought IGZO is not for large panels...

@rogo as discussed, that's how their 60" timeline would look like and that's when downstream will notice 60" tightness...

Reading like a suspense novel :P

"A. If you have a chance to take a look at retail stores, we think you will understand there is an excessive competition for 55” and retail stores will not increase any more of 55” TVs. While 55” are not selling so well, our 60” are selling well and we expect one million unit sales in the US this fiscal year, which is seven times higher than the previous fiscal year.
When we started business in the US selling only 60”TVs, they didn’t sell very well. But when we added 70” in the product line, 60” started selling very well, and likewise after we added 80” to the production line, both 60” and 70” started selling well. This may not be really answering your question but this is our strategy in large panel TVs and reasons for not focusing on 55”

"We expect that, with the full-fledged shipment of IGZO starting from February, there will be no utilisation loss at Kameyama and that ASP will at least increase by 4-5 times, which will help improve fab profitability."

It's funny that's under TV business when the only possible explanation of that is that the production is, in fact, headed for Apple. I mean, I guess they call LCD the "TV business". ASP increasing 4-5x is probably "per substrate" from garbage 40" displays to a lot of 10" super-high-res screens.

"We are expecting that inventory of 60” and 70” will be almost zero, assuming there is only demand for internal sales and no significant recovery in external sales till then""

This reads like they can't give away 60" panels. I'm not surprised given the yen and the fact that everyone else also has excess capacity, but that's how I read that.

"But I thought IGZO is not for large panels.."

Sounds like they have the 10G going IGZO 6 quarters from now (and obviously, perhaps a bit later.. I mean that's far out). Maybe they master making IGZO backplanes on the 8G and by the middle of next year, whatever glitches made them sub-optimal for going all the way to the 10G are ironed out. The phased approach suggests they are positive it's cheaper, positive it's the future, but uncertain when the investment makes sense. I mean, even Kameyama isn't forecast by them to be full IGZO for 6 quarters.

"When we started business in the US selling only 60”TVs, they didn’t sell very well. But when we added 70” in the product line, 60” started selling very well, and likewise after we added 80” to the production line, both 60” and 70” started selling well. This may not be really answering your question but this is our strategy in large panel TVs and reasons for not focusing on 55"

The claim here is that people wouldn't buy the 60" until the 70" made it look reasonable in size (that's more or less the claim). And that the 70" seems reasonable next to an 80". Let's say we accept this... The fact remains that if they grew 70" sales to even 500K units this year, that would be (a) exceptional growth and (b) still only 1 month of the plant at utilization. They can't solve their problems making 70" TVs which wholesale for an average of $2500 (across all models). There simply aren't enough sales to do that; it's probably only about $500-750MM in gross margin total.

And worse than that, they can't justify running the plant for such a small production. Basically, they have to find ways to sell an awful lot more 60" TVs. And 70s and 80s.

They talked about Sakai being cut to 50% is the implications of what you wrote. My math indicates it's never been above that.

So here's hoping they decide that putting out cheap 90" would REALLY help 60" and 70" sales.

Great thought cane. Under Sharp's logic, that would really send 80" sales soaring too.

They really did torpedo the size/$ scale didn't they? The highest quality is still priced at a premium of course, but when the yet to ship 2012 65" VT50 Panasonic plasma can be preordered for <$4k straight away you know there's been an impact. (btw I'm very disappointed that Panny didn't announce anything >65 in the consumer space).

I wouldn't be at all surprised if the 90" streets for <$5k a year from now unless it's 4K res in which case it'll likely be (much) higher. The existing 80" is already <$4k and I think the upcoming 8 series model gets their pretty quick as the 80632 slides down toward $3k. Amazing.

Looks like the 75" Samsung has a prie (8k) and the new "elite lite" 945 70" sharp is a far ore reasonable 4k msrp (source HDguru)


The elite is so impressive. Few flaws. I just hope we te 80% of the picture quality and no "flashing"...... The cyan issue is crazy but the flashing one can see in some scenes really easy)

The 70" 945 is $4500. I'm sure it will street below $4k in no time, but just want to point out actual msrp.

The Samsung is being priced such that it might as well come emblazoned with a "don't buy me" tag on it. That speaks volumes about Samsung's intentions not to make / sell very many.

True, but only to a certain extent. Sharp seems to be selling a good number of Elite 70"ers at about the same price, obscene though it may be.

Huh? Not even close. Even at release it was closer to $7k and now routinely sells for below $6k. I don't consider it a proxy.

I'm not sure what you think a good number is, but to give you a very rough sense, Sharp moved ~300,000 70" displays total in 2011. Of that total, Elites were no more than a very low-five-figure portion. While I expect a full year of Elite 70s to sell better -- as I'm sure does Sharp -- it's a really tiny volume product.

The Samsung will sell even less, unless the discounting is more significant.

The noteworthy thing here is that Sharp will sell, again, hundreds of thousands of 70s, perhaps 400K-500K (they -- and we -- hope). Samsung offers no other 75"; the entire production is that high-end model.

Yes in US but looks like huge size will be pushed globally this year. 500k should be conservative even after considering 10G running 50% utilization for 6 months.

The other noteworthy thing here is that with an 80" Sharp already on the market for 1/2 the price of the 75" Samsung, and another 80" Sharp coming at 3/4 the price with likely comparable-ish performance, the Samsung will either have to be heavily discounted, or will be dead in the water (I.e. left at a high price, and sold only in microscopic volume to people who want "the best" and assume that highest price always = best).

True but samsung has always been largely ignorant when it comes to pricing on its larger sets and I dont think this will be any different

I'm planning on getting a 70 inch television.

My plans for this television are Xbox 360, Watching Movies (over my network so I won't be using a bluray player. Either this or by connecting my laptop to my TV and watching the movies I have on my laptop but still from a file format and not the disc), and HD television(I plan on getting a HD box from comcast). Do I need the 240 hz, 3D (I assume no I will probably never buy a 3D title), and other features of the newer versions of this TV coming out?

Looks like Sharp needs to be "rescued" to produce IGZO display for Apple. Does sound like Sharp will also be the one providing the Apple TV display. There goes the theory that Sharp is making tons of money from 10G making huge panels. Sharp Display Products is the 10G plant.

Hon Hai is the assembly partner of Apple in China, and the major shareholder of the largest panel maker in Taiwan- CMI

" March 27 (Bloomberg) -- Sharp Corp., which forecast a record loss this year, plans to raise 132.5 billion yen ($1.6billion) by selling new shares in itself to Foxconn Technology
Group and a stake in a display unit to Foxconn’s founder.
Foxconn, including Taipei-listed flagship Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., will buy 9.9 percent of Sharp for 66.9 billion yen, the Osaka-based company said in a statement today. Sharp
will sell shares for 550 yen, which is 11 percent more than its closing price today. Foxconn chairman Terry Gou and related investment corporations also will buy 46.5 percent of the
display unit for 66 billion yen."
" The sale of its Sharp Display Products shares will cut Sharp’s stake in the venture with Sony to 46.5 percent. Sony will keep its 7 percent holding, it said."

I commented on this in the other forum here: http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1402351

Bare with me as Its my first post, but I have been hunting everywhere to find a list of all sharp 70" models and the features they have. Does such thing exists? Someone point a newb in the right direction!

AVS has a lot of info on specific models but I can't find a comparison list to begin to choose.

Help!