In our mobile phones, tablets, and notebooks, most of them currently use LCD and OLED display panels. Because of the organic self-luminous characteristics, OLED has the advantages of brighter, higher contrast, and thinner and flexible display than traditional LCD panels. Since 2017, it has been adopted by iPhone X and has been popularized by a large number of mobile phone manufacturers.
The ideal of "bringing better visual effects to users" is very beautiful, but OLED essentially relies on the color light emitted by the organic compound coating between the positive and negative electrodes, and its life span is less than half of the LCD backlight LED lamp beads. If the OLED screen displays the same picture for a long time, it will cause this part of the pixels to quickly age, which will affect the overall subsequent display effect and become a "burn-in" problem that OLED can never escape. This is true for mobile phones, and it is even more difficult to use OLED panels on tablets and notebooks with longer replacement cycles.
Although manufacturers can use algorithms to change display methods to extend the life of OLED panels, OLED burn-in still cannot be fundamentally resolved. In addition, the long-term yield problem of OLED also keeps the cost high. Manufacturers basically only dare to mount OLED panels for flagship products with high enough profits; therefore, what prevents OLED from spreading in the field of commercial display is actually burn-in (lifetime) and the cost issue.
According to a report from TechInsights, a 256GB iPhone X costs US$77 for an OLED panel, accounting for 19.5% of the BOM cost of the whole machine. The cost of a larger iPhone XS Max also exceeds 18% of the BOM of the whole machine. It is equipped with OLED. The most expensive part of the panel iPhone. Most of these OLED panels come from industry giant Samsung. Samsung has almost no rivals in terms of production capacity. Apple has to pay Samsung a large amount every year to purchase OLED panels that meet the requirements.
In 2019, Apple's iPhone 11 returned to the high-quality and inexpensive LCD. In the market, the ultra-high cost-effective iPhone 11 surpassed the iPhone XR, which is also LCD, and became the best-selling iPhone in 2020. But there are ups and downs. Apple often receives contract fines from Samsung because it does not purchase OLEDs in accordance with the contract.
In July 2020, the global display field information agency DSCC stated that Samsung, which originally expected a decline in revenue in the second quarter, had achieved a “turn from loss to profit” in the quarter’s financial report due to a one-time payment of US$950 million from Apple. ", Gaoda's 8.1 trillion won (about 6.6 billion U.S. dollars) operating profit, an increase of 23% year-on-year, beat a lot of analysts.
In 2020, iPhone 12 will use OLED screens in all series. On the one hand, it is to support the Dolby Vision video shooting and playback of all iPhone 12 series. On the other hand, it also benefits from the addition of LGD supported by Apple to the supply chain system; but in general Samsung's OLED screen hegemony remains unchanged. Over-reliance on Samsung OLED screens makes Apple have to find a new generation of technology. At this time, Mini LED has become a new choice.
