Samsung, Sony, LG Slash Outlooks on LCD Consumption; LCD Rentals Still of Value

By Erin Monda on Fri, 2011-07-29 11:07

Here in the LCD rental world, we’ve been playing close attention to the rumors that Samsung, Sony and LG want to cut back on their LCD production. While any such cutbacks might bode poorly for the overall market, not all locations are suffering quite the same slowdown.

While the demand for LCDs in North America and Western Europe might be growing more tepid, developing areas like India are booming. India’s semiconductor revenues are going to hit $15 billion by 2015, thanks to an increased consumption of LCD televisions. The compound growth rate is estimated at about 16 percent year over year.

According to Gartner research director Ganesh Ramamoorthy, the boom simply makes sense. Ramamoorthy said "Given the low penetration and the growing demand for key electronic equipments such as mobile phones, desktop and laptop computers and LCD TV's, we believe the Indian market will be able to easily sustain high growth rates in the coming years."

India’s demographics are changing, and many American companies are beginning to set up LCD manufacturing overseas. This would explain the boom – but oddly enough, this analysis is in stark contrast to other news we’re hearing about the industry.

Considering that bellwether Sony is experiencing losses and is rumoured to pull out of a LCD manufacturing deal with Samsung. While only a rumor at this point, such a move would make sense. The company just cut its annual sales figure estimates by nearly 20 percent – which isn’t the most reassuring bit of news.

Samsung’s LCD business unit saw an operating loss from last year due to a nine percent loss in sales. But the company is still seeing a rise in profits, according to CBR – but that’s because of investments in the telecommunications field.

LG, another respected maker, is also stating that its growth will be stunted this quarter – but won’t release actual numbers, for now.

Whatever plights may fall the keystone manufacturers of LCD devices, IT rental like Vernon Computer Source stand uniquely poised to take advantage. Due to businesses having decreased budgets, taking advantage of an LCD rental (instead of flat-out purchasing the screens) makes a whole lot of sense.