In 2021, the global sales of OLED materials will reach US$1.686 billion (equivalent to approximately RMB 10.735 billion), a year-on-year increase of 30%. The huge growth in 2019 – a 40% year-on-year increase from 2018 – is expected to repeat itself in 2022 as the world recovers from the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic. It is estimated that in 2022, the global sales of OLED materials will reach 2.195 billion US dollars (equivalent to about 13.976 billion yuan), a year-on-year increase of 30%.
In the context of the booming OLED material market, the Korean company Solus Advanced Materials (hereinafter referred to as "Solus"), which is a supplier of Samsung Display, is also stepping up its deployment of OLED materials.
According to a report by Korean media ETnews in February this year, Solus will start an organic light-emitting diode (OLED) material factory in Jiangsu, China, and will provide test products to display panel manufacturers in Greater China, starting from July this year at the earliest. .
The Jiangsu factory will prepare for operations with the goal of providing prototypes of OLED light-emitting materials. It is understood that the factory mainly produces Solus' OLED blue light-emitting core materials – aEFL, electron transport layer (ETL) and other light-emitting materials.
The total investment of the factory is about 23 billion won (equivalent to about 120 million yuan). The construction started early last year and was completed in April of the same year. It is Solus’s first overseas OLED material production base, aiming at the Chinese OLED material market. Expand the supply of luminescent materials. Currently, Solus is supplying luminescent materials to Samsung Display and LG Display, two of South Korea's largest panel makers, and has started to win new customers.
The decision of Solus to start the Chinese factory, on the one hand, shows that foreign OLED material companies have a positive attitude towards the future growth of China's OLED material market. It seems that there will be a certain competitive impact.
Solus Advanced Materials is currently mainly engaged in battery foil business and new materials business. In the new materials business, in addition to OLED light-emitting materials, it also produces QD materials that can improve the color efficiency of quantum dot (QD) displays, and develops non-emitting materials such as red and green QD inkjets.
According to Solus' 2021 fiscal year annual report, the company's sales last year were 381.2 billion won (equivalent to about 1.991 billion yuan), a year-on-year increase of 31.4%; operating profit was 2 billion won (equivalent to about 10 million yuan), down 9.35% from the same period last year %. Solus explained that the increase in operating costs, such as the mass production of battery foil factories in Europe, deepening power shortages and rising raw material prices were the main factors behind the decline in profits.
"Due to the growth of the electric vehicle market, the expansion of OLED supply and the advancement of biotechnology, we will secure future growth opportunities by developing custom-made materials to strengthen our role as a materials company," said Genwen Guo, Solus' CFO. position."
In addition, according to a recent report by TheElec Korea, Samsung Display may add Solus as a cover layer (CPL) supplier to its M12 OLED material (Samsung Display OLED material iteration system code) supply chain. Solus has been Samsung Display M10 OLED before. The sole supplier of CPL for the material supply chain. It is reported that the M12 OLED material will be first used in Samsung's foldable mobile phones and iPhone 14 series launched later this year.