In February, affected by the Lunar New Year and fewer working days, panel shipments of all applications weakened. The LCD TV panel shipment came to 17.14 million units, declining 1.6% MoM, the monitor panel shipment was 12.11 million units, trimming 3% MoM, the NB panel shipment dropped 4% MoM to 14.22 million units as NB brands showed rush orders, some panel makers’ back-end labor shortage issue eased, and Korean makers’ NB panel supply was not as conservative as expected. The tablet panel shipment dropped 7% MoM to 18.09 million units as most brands’ conducted adjustments despite white-box brands had heating-up demands for 7” WSVGA (1024*600) panels.

“As the mid-and low-end tablet panel market grows rapidly, brands and white-box brands show significant changes in product developments,” WitsView senior research manager Jeffy Chen indicates.

“In the past, the white-box tablet brands used mainly 7” TN WVGA (800*480) panels to gain share in the USD 50 entry-level tablet market. While brands start to use 7” TN WSVGA (1024*600) panel to build mid-and low-end lineup to share the market, white-box brands lift the panel resolution to WSVGA to fight back, growingly boosting the demand for 7” TN WSVGA panels.”

Based on the February shipment, the shipment for 7” TN WSVGA panels came to 0.497 million units, rising 37% from January and jumping largely 300% from the same period last year.

The rapid emergence of tablet panels brings opportunities to Chinese makers, especially BOE focusing on mobile devices and using in Q4 its G8.5 to produce 7” and 10.1” tablet panels on top of the G5 and G6 originally planned for mobile devices. Based on WitsView’s survey, BOE’s tablet panel shipment amounted to 3.41 million units in February, which not only was the historical peak for BOE’s tablet business and lifted its proportion in the overall tablet panel market, from 2% in Feb. 2013 to 19% as it outpaced Taiwanese makers and only lagged behind the Koreans.

Figure I: February Large-sized LCD panel shipment (K units)

Figure II: Tablet panel market shares by makers (7 "of resolution 1024 * 600 and above)