Development of 5G products and network has been ongoing in the past years. And the commercialization of 5G is expected to roll out in 2019, with 5G telecom services to be planned in the United States, South Korea, Japan, and China, etc. The arrival of 5G smartphones will also be in the spotlight this year. According to TrendForce’s latest report, Android smartphone brands, such as Samsung, Huawei, Xiaomi, OPPO, Vivo, and One Plus, all have a chance to launch 5G smartphones in 2019. However, the production volume of 5G models would only be 5 million units this year, a penetration rate of 0.4%, since the construction of 5G related infrastructure has not been fully completed.
According to the latest report by WitsView, a division of TrendForce, increasing penetration of UHD display panels has driven the consumption of driver IC in the past few years. The total consumption grew by 8.4% YoY in 2018, but the growth would slow down to 3% this year due to technology variation in designs of large-size panels and falling shipments of small-size panels.
According to the latest report by WitsView, a division of TrendForce, shipments of large-size panels reached 804.06 million pieces in 2018, a YoY growth of 2.5%. Among all the large-size display panel applications, only tablet panel recorded decreasing shipments last year, while other categories registered noticeable growth. The segment of TV panel was driven by new production capacity in the industry and special deal projects, while the LCD monitor segment grew due to the increased production volume of borderless monitors and momentum from global sports events. As for notebook panels, notebook manufacturers started their stock-ups earlier than previous years, in fear of the shortage of components like driver ICs. As a result, the notebook panel shipments for 2018 increased as well.
After contract prices of DRAM products turned downward sharply in 4Q18 by 10% QoQ, major DRAM manufacturers have tried to offset fall in prices by slowing down capacity expansion in 2019, as the demand outlook for PCs, servers, smartphones, and other end consumer products remains weak, reports DRAMeXchange, a division of TrendForce.
The Taiwanese Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) has announced a 10.17% decrease to next year’s feed-in tariff (FIT) rates for solar PV installations, which is much higher than the average decrease of 4.25% in the global PV industry. This will make 2019 a tough year for Taiwan’s PV industry, with wider-than-expected impacts on the whole market, says EnergyTrend, a division of TrendForce.