OLED materials and organic photovoltaic materials producer Lumtec said recently that it has started to develop and produce OLED lighting panels, and plans to expand the monthly production capacity of panels from the current 150,000 pieces to 600,000 pieces in the fourth quarter.
Lumtec President Yen Feng-wen said that OLED lighting panels can be used in automotive tail lights, direction indicators, indoor reading and decorative lights. The company will issue new shares in the fourth quarter of this year to raise NT $ 180 million (US $ 5.8 million) for capacity expansion.
Yen pointed out that Lumtec is currently the only OLED material supplier in Taiwan, which can provide about 30 formulations of OLED materials to meet the needs of different display manufacturers. Its major customers include AU Optronics, PMOLED producers Xunbao Technology and Zhijing Optoelectronics, as well as BOE and Tianma Microelectronics. At the same time, Lumtec has obtained patents for more than 15 formulations of OLED materials.
The price of the patented OLED material is about $ 30 / g, and the gross profit rate is 60-70%, while the price of the OLED material without the patented formula is only $ 3 / g, and the gross profit rate is 5-8%. As many Chinese manufacturers have been expanding the production capacity of OLED panels, the company is expected to begin bulk shipment of patented OLED materials to mainland Chinese manufacturers in the second half of 2020.
Lumtec's OLED materials are currently shipped to customers in 71 countries around the world, of which panel manufacturers account for 30-40% of total OLED material sales, and more than 3000 academic and research institutions account for 60-70%. Lumtec currently produces about 1 ton of OLED materials per month, which is sufficient to support 8 OLED panel production lines. In addition, the company's current capacity utilization rate is 30-40%.