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Corning Looks to 10.5G Fabs and Flexible Glass for Growth
May 06, 2019 The display glass market is split between Corning, Nippon Electric Glass and Asahi Glass. But Corning has the dominant share at 48% of the total market, while Nippon and Asahi account for 22% and 24%, respectively. Corning's Display Technologies segment represented 29% of GLW's sales in 2018. Corning's fusion process is scalable, and the company believes it is the most cost-effective process in producing large size substrates. This process enabled Corning to build a 10.5G LCD glass substrate manufacturing facility in the Hefei Xinzhan Hi-Tech Industrial Development Zone in the Anhui Province, China for BOE. 10.5G substrates measure 2,940 mm by 3,370 mm, providing the most economical cuts for 65-inch and 75-inch TVs. The 10.5G substrates manufactured at the Hefei facility use Corning EAGLE XG Slim glass.The next table shows are the number of 10.5G substrates being manufactured through 2018, and forecasts for substrate production in 2019 and 2020. Table 1: 10.5G Fab Substrate/Month Capacity |
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Source: The Information Net
BOE Technology’s first 10.5G fab, located in Hefei, entered volume production in the first half of 2018. China Star Optoelectronics Technology (CSOT) plans to kick off commercial operations of its 10.5G plant in 1H 2019, having installed equipment in 2018. For 2019, BOE’s second 10.5G line, to be located in Wuhan, is slated for volume production in 2020, with equipment installation in mid-2019. Foxconn starts equipment installation at its new 10.5G LCD plant in Guangzhou in early 2019, with plans to kick off the first phase of the facility in Aug 2019 and to begin volume production in October 2019. LG Display is building its 10.5G OLED P10 fab in Paju, Korea, with volume production scheduled at the beginning of 2021. Originally, the company planned to install equipment in 3Q 2018, but it was pushed back to the beginning of 2020, due largely to economic considerations.
Corning's Specialty Materials segment represented 13% of sales for 2018. This segment manufactures products that provide more than 150 material formulations for glass, glass ceramics and fluoride crystals to meet demand for unique customer needs. Consequently, this segment operates in a wide variety of commercial and industrial markets that include display optics and components, semiconductor optics components, aerospace and defense, astronomy, ophthalmic products, telecommunications components and cover glass that is optimized for display devices. Corning Gorilla Glass is a thin sheet glass designed specifically to function as a cover glass for display devices such as mobile phones, tablets and notebook PCs. Gorilla Glass 6 is a new chemically strengthened and highly compressed glass that Corning says has twice the drop protection of its Gorilla Glass 5. New smartphones have glass on both sides; thus, Corning provides more sheets of glass per phone. Overall for the smartphone industry, glass-back penetration on smartphones doubled from 15% in 2017 to 30% in 2018, and the trend is expected to continue.
The current crop of foldable phones is made with plastic, deviating from the glass cover of smartphones for past decade. Corning is currently working on developing an ultra-thin, durable and optically advantaged glass solution for the inside cover of a continuous display that can bend at a tight radius hundreds of thousands of times without significant damage at the fold. Corning is working with customers on this challenge and is currently sampling this development glass with them to optimize the product for their design requirements. Corning ultra-thin, highly bendable glass development includes:
Asahi Glass has developed Dragontrail, a competitor to Corning Gorilla Glass, that has a thickness of only 0.07 mm, which is 5-6 times thinner than the glass used on standard smartphones. Despite such modest thickness, as the manufacturer assures, its glass is 80% stronger. AGC announced its technology at Display Week 2018 but has not yet been released. DSCC’s forecasts are shown below, but they were made before the release of the Fold.
Figure 1: DSCC’s Foldable Smartphone Forecast
Corning's Specialty Materials segment represented 13% of sales for 2018. This segment manufactures products that provide more than 150 material formulations for glass, glass ceramics and fluoride crystals to meet demand for unique customer needs. Consequently, this segment operates in a wide variety of commercial and industrial markets that include display optics and components, semiconductor optics components, aerospace and defense, astronomy, ophthalmic products, telecommunications components and cover glass that is optimized for display devices. Corning Gorilla Glass is a thin sheet glass designed specifically to function as a cover glass for display devices such as mobile phones, tablets and notebook PCs. Gorilla Glass 6 is a new chemically strengthened and highly compressed glass that Corning says has twice the drop protection of its Gorilla Glass 5. New smartphones have glass on both sides; thus, Corning provides more sheets of glass per phone. Overall for the smartphone industry, glass-back penetration on smartphones doubled from 15% in 2017 to 30% in 2018, and the trend is expected to continue.
The current crop of foldable phones is made with plastic, deviating from the glass cover of smartphones for past decade. Corning is currently working on developing an ultra-thin, durable and optically advantaged glass solution for the inside cover of a continuous display that can bend at a tight radius hundreds of thousands of times without significant damage at the fold. Corning is working with customers on this challenge and is currently sampling this development glass with them to optimize the product for their design requirements. Corning ultra-thin, highly bendable glass development includes:
- Ultra-thin, bendable glass that is optimized for foldable devices has demonstrated success in a range of thickness of 125µm down to 35 µm in R&D.
- Tested to bend hundreds of thousands of times without damage while maintaining its flatness, even after 100,000 bends.
- Enable a static bend for extended time periods, addressing the design requirements of foldable devices, is thinner and more bendable than their Willow Glass solution.
- Delivers a superior surface with improved durability, excellent scratch resistance, and superior optical clarity when compared to alternate materials plastic solutions.
- Provides optical clarity with no discoloration or crazing with bending or at high temperature/high humidity.
Asahi Glass has developed Dragontrail, a competitor to Corning Gorilla Glass, that has a thickness of only 0.07 mm, which is 5-6 times thinner than the glass used on standard smartphones. Despite such modest thickness, as the manufacturer assures, its glass is 80% stronger. AGC announced its technology at Display Week 2018 but has not yet been released. DSCC’s forecasts are shown below, but they were made before the release of the Fold.
Figure 1: DSCC’s Foldable Smartphone Forecast
Source: DSCC
The high and low forecasts for 2019 look high in light of the problems encountered by Samsung and the late releases by Royole and Huawei. Nonetheless, even the 66 million foldable smartphone forecast for 2023 represents only 4% of the overall market. Glass makers such as GLW will sell more glass per smartphone, if they can meet the foldable specs, since the size of the screen is larger. From: Castellano