On April 2, LG announced its launch strategy for OLED TVs in China this year in Beijing. It will promote OLED TVs, increase advertising, and promote products to third- and fourth-tier markets through all channels.
At the same time, LG has also attracted domestic manufacturers such as Changhong, Skyworth and Konka to "join" and will work together to accelerate the popularity of OLED in the Chinese market.
Liu Buchen, an expert in the home appliance industry, said that judging from LG's actions, it can be seen that it is indeed a global leader in the field of OLED. From its previous early release to its current price reduction promotion, LG intends to keep pressure on Samsung and overtake Samsung in the next generation of display technology.
Liu Buchen said that LG's price reduction promotion in China shows how important the Chinese market is to it. This is also because LG needs Chinese TV manufacturers to "carry the sedan chair" for it to jointly promote the popularity of OLED TVs, and LG also needs to find sales for its own OLED panels.
Accelerate the popularization of OLED TVs
Although Labor Day is nearly a month away, major TV manufacturers can’t wait and are gearing up to do something big. LG is no exception, but this time the protagonist representing LG is OLED TV.
Xu Jinhua, director of the marketing department of LG Electronics Black Electronics Division, said that during the May Day period, LG will promote OLED TVs, and consumers who purchase OLED TVs will receive LG’s curved OLED mobile phones as gifts.
Last year, LG and Samsung successively launched OLED TVs in China, but the prices were higher. LG released the world's first 55-inch curved OLED TV last year, the 55EA9800. At that time, the price of the product was as high as $15,000. In February this year, the price of this TV dropped by half to only US$7,000, which is equivalent to about 42,000 yuan in RMB. The price is still relatively high for domestic consumers.
LG announced a promotion for OLED TVs in China this time. Will it make significant price adjustments? Xu Jinhua did not disclose the specific price reduction, but said that there will be no significant price reduction.
At the same time as the price promotion, LG also announced that it will increase advertising efforts and adopt an omni-channel strategy to cover online and offline markets. In addition to first- and second-tier markets, it will also enter third- and fourth-tier markets through dealers and specialty store channels. Xu Jinhua said that this year will continue to enrich and expand the OLED TV product line and accelerate the popularity of OLED in China.
Hisense launches ULED to challenge OLED
At yesterday's press conference, in addition to LG, domestic TV manufacturers Changhong, Skyworth and Konka also appeared. Last year, after LG and Samsung successively released OLED TVs, domestic color TV manufacturers also joined the team at the end of the same year. Well-known brands such as Skyworth, Konka, and Changhong have launched their own OLED TV products.
It is understood that the current OLED TVs of Skyworth, Konka, Changhong and other companies all come from LG DisPlay's WRGBOLED technology. Currently, the OLED panels produced by LG Display are not only supplied to LG, but also to domestic TV manufacturers such as Skyworth, Konka, and Changhong.
Bai Zhiqiang, general manager of Changhong Multimedia China Marketing Center, said that 20 cities will be selected in April to conduct in-depth cooperation with LG on OLED TVs.
Liu Buchen said that LG's price reduction promotion in China shows how important the Chinese market is to it. This is also because LG needs Chinese TV manufacturers to "carry the sedan chair" for it to jointly promote the popularity of OLED TVs. Otherwise, LG's own promotion power will be limited, and LG also needs to find sales for its own OLED panels.
It is worth noting that not long ago, Hisense launched three new 4KULED (abbreviation for UltraLED) TV products in Shanghai, making a high-profile challenge to OLED TVs. Hisense believes that ULED TVs use new backlight technology and are not inferior to OLED in terms of color saturation, contrast, and brightness.
However, many people in the industry believe that ULED is simply a super LCD TV. It is just an improvement on LCD technology and is not a completely new technology.
"Chinese home appliance companies have no say in defining products globally, whether it is LCD, plasma or now OLED, and if there is no company to play with you, relying on one company to promote it will inevitably lead to failure." Liu Buchen believes that it is okay if Hisense only uses ULED as a short-term transitional product, but as a direction for future efforts, attention must be paid to avoid repeating Panasonic's failure in the field of plasma TVs.
ANNA