After abandoning in-house production of LCD TV panels, Samsung is planning to also withdraw from LED production, including LED backlights for "QLED" LCD TVs.
As part of a strategic shift, Samsung will gradually cease LED production by 2030 as it believes the business has lost its competitive edge, according to multiple industry reports.
- "Samsung Electronics has decided to withdraw its non-core LED business under the DS division and is taking steps to reorganize it. The LED business team is mainly responsible for LED modules for TVs, LEDs for smartphone flash, and LED modules for automobiles. It produces about 2 trillion won in sales annually, but the focus is intended to shift to key areas," reported Maeil Business News Korea.
According to a source, Samsung will halt production of LED chips for lighting by the first half of 2026 and exit the LED backlight business (for TVs) by the second half of 2026. The final step will be to exit the automotive LED business by 2030.
How it will affect Samsung TVs
After an almost decade-long delay, Samsung finally began its transition to OLED TVs in 2022, launching QD-OLED and later adding models based on LG Display's WOLED panels. The changes will not impact OLED TVs in any way.
However, it will impact Samsung's many LCD TV models, including "QLED" and "Neo QLED" models.
These TVs already use LCD panels from TCL, BOE, LG Display and other display makers after Samsung Display decided to terminate all production of LCD TV panels in June 2022.
Samsung already uses Chinese LCD panels in its "QLED" models. Photo: Samsung
Soon, Samsung Electronics will also have to source LED backlights, including miniLED, from external suppliers, mainly Chinese vendors.
In other words, neither the display (LCD panel) nor the backlight (LED, miniLED) in a Samsung TV will be developed or manufactured by Samsung itself in the near future. The South Korean TV maker has in recent years lost its edge in miniLED LCD TVs to leaner Chinese rivals such as Hisense and TCL.
Micro-LED development to continue
It is expected that Samsung will reassign personnel to its semiconductor, micro-LED, memory and foundry businesses, suggesting that development of micro-LED displays will continue.
Micro-LEDs are small enough to be used as individual sub-pixels in displays, eliminating the need for an LCD panel. Samsung already sells $100,000+ micro-LED TVs, which are the company's first-ever true LED TVs, despite having marketed conventional LCD TVs as "LED" and "QLED" TVs for 15 years.
The large-format LED displays are also used in stadiums and a few movie theaters.
- Source: Maeil Business Korea, DisplayDaily, Semicone
