Forecast for 2016 Display Industry ‘not Rosy,’ IHS Analyst Says

IHS Technology sees 2016 as “a sluggish year for the display industry,” Yoonsung Chung, IHS senior manager-large display, said in a report. Though TV panel shipments and prices were “robust” in the first half of 2015, this trend “turned around” in the second half, mainly from the decline in IT product demand and the “subdued consumption” in emerging markets caused by the strong U.S. dollar, Chung said. In 2016, the display market “will suffer from external factors,” including the continued strength of the dollar, but also “economic recession in China and Brazil” as well as “internal issues,” such as excess panel inventory carryover from 2015, he said: “The forecast for 2016 is not rosy, due to both internal and external factors. There are constantly new entrants and investments, while demand growth is not optimistic. It goes for all industries to say that such [a] market environment can lead to industry-wide restructuring with only the self-sustaining resilient players in the market surviving.”