During 2009Q1 to 2011Q4, several TFT-LCD production lines will be put into operation in the world including the second 8G production line of Samsung, LG 8G production line, AUO 7.5G and 8.5G line, Chi Mei 8G line, UniVenture 6G line, Sharp 10G line, BOE 6G line in Hefei and IPS ALPHA 8G line. At the end of Aug 2009, BOE declared to invest RMB28 billion to establish 8G line; Kunshan Longfei Optical Electronics will invest RMB3.3 billion to establish 8.5G line; InfoVision Optoelectronics will invest RMB3.2 billion to set up 8G line; and Sharp will establish 8G line in Nanjing. Meanwhile, there are a number of uncertain 8G line projects in Suzhou and Guangzhou. In China, almost RMB100 billion will be injected into TFT-LCD production lines.

Of investments in TFT-LCD production lines, 55% will go to equipments; 20% to civil engineering; and 10% to land expropriation. Japan is a place where has the most TFT-LCD equipment manufacturers and the world’s giants in this field cluster. Japanese companies have absolute competitive edge, with their market share always above 40% and even 70% in the core realm. Among TFT-LCD equipments, exposure machine is most expensive followed by CVD and PVD. Just Canon and Nikon can produce array-segment exposure machine; sales price of one array-segment exposure machine will be as high as several-hundred-million US dollars.

70% of global TFT-LCD equipments production value comes from Japanese companies. In contrast, Chinese enterprises have little investment in core technology, without any production value of TFT-LCD equipment. Since the large size of TFT-LCD equipment particularly in 8G line, transport cost is exceedingly high. 

In South Korea and Taiwan, there are some non-core-area TFT-LCD equipments producers.

Top 3 TFT-LCD Equipment Manufacturers