Chinese Display Manufacturer to Domestically Produce Equipment

Chinese display manufacturer called BOE is developing its own equipment. 

It is planning not to be limited with production of its own panels but also dominate rear-end industry. It is predicted that this will be significant blow to South Korean equipment industry that was looking to benefit from massive investments made by Chinese display manufacturers on production lines.

According to an industry on the 12th, Sineva, which is a display equipment affiliate of BOE Group, has recently developed robot equipment for 10.5th Generation LCD Panels. Starting with this, Sineva is speeding up a process of domestically producing its own equipment.

Sineva developed and demonstrated panel transportation robots that can carry 10.5th Generation (2940x3370mm) glass substrates with 0.5mm of thickness. This is same standard as 10.5th Generation (B9) Line that was recently invested by BOE. Sineva set up production facilities for transportation robots in Anhui Province, where B9 Line is located. It also introduced transportation equipment for past 6th Generation LCD Panels.

Sineva was established in 2013 so that Chinese Government and BOE can domestically produce their own equipment and its headquarters is in Beijing. It has local corporate bodies in Hefei and Fuyang and is manufacturing equipment and developing cutting-edge materials. Not only is it developing robots for semiconductors and services and products for Smart Factories, it is also supplying color photo-resist for displays and LCD (Liquid Crystal Polymer) materials to BOE.

Sineva’s sales in 2014 were 99.91 million Yuan (about $15.4 million (17.714 billion KRW)). Hefei Government is estimating that Sineva’s sales in 2015 are going to be 500 million Yuan ($77.3 million (88.65 billion KRW)), which is going to be about 5 times increase.

Sineva was established with guidance from COITF (China Optoelectric & Innovation Technology Fund) and it was established with private equity funds that were worth 10 billion Yuan (about $1.55 billion (1.773 trillion KRW)). Infinity Group, which is an investing company from Israel, and BOE had participated in this investment.

Industry believes that investments from Chinese Government and BOE have expanded from domestic production of panels to domestic production of equipment. As Central Government is investing huge amount of money to domestically produce displays and semiconductors, BOE is hoping to secure competitive edge in this industry by domestically producing all equipment, materials and parts that belong to rear-end industry.

Actually Chinese Government announced in May of last year about ‘China Manufacturing 2025’ strategy and proclaimed that it will enhance industries by going through 3 stages for next 30 years. Chinese Government’s goal is to secure major technologies in rear-end industries as well as front-end industries and to increase competitive edge in its industry ecosystem.

“BOE’s goal is to domestically produce panels and equipment.” said a representative of a Chinese business that is familiar with situations of Sineva. “It is gaining cutting-edge technologies through various methods such as partnering up with global equipment industries.”

Staff Reporter Bae, Okjin | [email protected] & Staff Reporter Lee, Jongjoon | [email protected]