Flat panel impact on CRT monitor markets
01/01/1998
Flat panel impact on CRT monitor markets
Joseph A. Castellano, Stanford Resources Inc., San Jose, California
Many non-CRT flat panel technologies came about as a result of concepts and fabrication techniques that were developed for the semiconductor industry. Prime examples are high density photolithography and thin-film deposition techniques, originally refined for semiconductor and IC manufacturing. These developments allowed an ever increasing number of pixels concurrent with decreasing pixel pitch in the dot matrix arrays, used by virtually all of the non-CRT technologies since 1975.
Flat panel displays are now available for computer applications in large quantities. In spite of their diverse operating mechanisms, these technologies have adapted and used many of the techniques and schemes devised for traditional CRT-based monitors. In fact, to penetrate the computer marketplace, flat panels must be designed in such a way that they "emulate" the CRT.
Major flat panel display technologies
Plasma display panels (PDPs). The most attractive aspect of color plasma display technology is that the structure of the display lends itself to "macroscopic" manufacturing techniques. The most widely discussed of these macro techniques is screen printing. Screen printing is a very old process by which art, T-shirts, and hybrid microelectronic circuit substrates are produced. Equipment for screen printing is relatively inexpensive and the throughput can be quite high.
When all flat panel technologies are examined in detail for size, color, speed, and manufacturability, the color plasma technology appears to be the most likely to be the first to meet all of the HDTV requirements. The required luminance is 200 nits, maximum pixel pitch is 0.8 mm or a modest 32 dots/in., and required contrast ratio is 50:1. The maximum power consumption of 200 W will be more difficult to achieve.
While color PDPs will undoubtedly become widely available for large screen consumer television in the next century, the technology does not lend itself to the desktop workstation or PC monitor market because of the difficulty in manufacturing high resolution (high pixel density) panels that are cost competitive with CRTs. Consequently, color PDPs are not expected to have much impact on the CRT computer monitor market.
Electroluminescent (EL) displays. The phenomenon of electroluminescence (or electrophotoluminescence as it was first called by George Destriau) was discovered in 1936. As the name implies, it is the direct conversion of electrical energy into luminous energy. The voltage level involved in electroluminescent displays is quite high because the electrons must acquire high energy from an electric field. The term high field electroluminescence is sometimes used to describe this behavior.
Since no available panels can yet display millions of colors in a cost competitive size, EL panels are not expected to have much impact on the mainstream computer monitor market. They will, however, find continuing applications as monitors in cases such as for medical or industrial instruments where compactness is vital.
Liquid crystal displays (LCDs). The key to successful implementation of LCDs as computer display monitors was the development of thin-film transistor (active matrix) schemes, which resulted in a marked improvement in contrast/viewing angle, while providing full color and the capability to address many more pixels. Today, 12- to 20-in. color displays for use as monitors are in demand, but their high price ($2000-$6000 for a plug-and-play monitor) limits their use to special applications. All major LCD makers recognize the potential of these devices to replace the bulky desktop CRT monitor, but until the prices come down for displays with an actual viewing screen size of 14- to 16-in, the impact on the mainstream computer monitor market will be small. While users would be quite happy to enjoy the space-savings of a flat, thin display monitor, they are not willing to pay a high premium for this feature. The major impact of TFT-LCDs on the computer monitor market will occur early in the next century.
Field emission displays (FED). The FED is a relatively new display technology that has attracted attention around the world. The potential applications for FEDs cover the entire spectrum of flat panel and CRT applications, assuming they can be scaled to large screen sizes. Future applications might include very large area, high resolution displays, possibly for HDTV. Whether or not the FED can be cost competitive with the conventional CRT monitor is still to be determined.
There are several issues to consider in trying to predict the success of the FED. On the positive side is the promise of CRT-like performance. The FED uses fewer resources than are needed to make full color, active matrix LCDs (organic chemistry, numerous thin films, polarizers, filters, glass, and fluorescent tubes).
On the negative side is the difficulty of moving a vacuum electron device into large-scale production. Conventional CRT plants are huge facilities with enormously complex, highly automated custom-made equipment. The FED must draw on some of this equipment and must use some of that needed to make active matrix LCDs. Cooperation and joint development are almost certainly required for FED technology to become commercially successful. There is almost no precedent for a single start-up venture taking such a complex product to the market alone. For comparison, look at the number of companies and the amount of money that has been spent - about $10 billion - trying to make active matrix LCDs competitive with CRTs.
The $500 million in effort and resources applied to the FED to date is quite small when compared to that expended on LCDs. Yet, despite the lack of a focused, large scale display effort, some products have already reached the market. The equipment and techniques needed for fabrication have advanced considerably since field emitter array development began over 20 years ago. The only products to reach the marketplace thus far are offered by Pixtech. The limited production of these panels are validation that the technology works. As other flat panel types increase in size, FED technology will continue to benefit from equipment advances, particularly deposition equipment.
The advantages of FED technology, besides that it is based on cathodoluminescence (a mature technology) and is a light emission device, are that it has
potentially high luminous efficiency;
a history of phosphor development behind it;
high speed addressing capability;
fast response; and
no temperature sensitivity.
The main disadvantages of FEDs are that
efficient low voltage phosphors are not yet developed;
an optimum manufacturing process is still not in place; and
large area photolithography and high temperature sealing equipment are needed.
It is too early to make an accurate prediction for FEDs. Realistically, these technologies may make a significant impact in the 2002-2005 time frame. This assumes that panels will be available with diagonal screen sizes of 15- to 19-in.; performance equals or exceeds that of conventional CRT monitors; and prices are only slightly higher (10-20%) than conventional monitors.
Sales of flat panels vs. CRT monitors
Flat panel display technology developers will continue to make use of advances in CRT monitors, including such innovations as cheaper memory, connected speech input, additional local intelligence, and sophisticated software.
In the near term, the most promising flat panel technology for potential use as a monitor is the LCD, which is now being used in portable computers. The use of LCDs has risen dramatically since modules with 300-mm and larger screens have become available at prices in the $500-$1000 range. However, note that this is for the display module only, not a fully configured monitor. Another $250-350 is needed to build a monitor. This additional cost alone is equivalent to the street price of most CRT-based monitors. Consequently, these displays are used almost exclusively in portable computers, not dedicated desktop systems, so little impact on the CRT monitor market has occurred.
Active matrix displays for notebook computer applications became available in small quantities in 1991; more than 10 million units were delivered in 1996. The viewing angle is much wider since each pixel receives the full voltage it requires to reach maximum contrast. While these millions of color displays made with TFTs are now on the market, the much higher price will prevent these displays from significantly displacing color CRT monitors in the desktop computer display market in the short term. Significant displacement will occur when the price for a flat-thin color LCD monitor approaches that of a color CRT monitor with an equal number of pixels and comparable viewable screen size.
Forecasts of the worldwide market for the various display devices in units and value of shipments are presented in Tables 1 and 2, respectively. The forecasts present data for five major display technologies used in nonconsumer applications and are only for graphic type displays; small segmented/character displays used in such products as auto dashboards, telephones, and portable instruments are not included.
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The compound annual growth rate (CAGR) for flat panel units is 18.7%, and 5.1% for CRT monitors over the forecast period (1997-2003). The world market for flat panels will grow to 87.4 million units in 2003 from 31.3 million units in 1997. By comparison, the world CRT monitor market will grow to 113.6 million units in 2003 from 84.2 million in 1997. The share of unit shipments for flat panel graphic displays will increase from 27% of all display types in 1997 to 43% in 2003.
In terms of market value, the CRT monitor market continues to dominate, but its share will erode gradually early next century. The worldwide market for CRT monitors will grow at a CAGR of just 3.7% to $25.9 billion in 2003 from $20.9 billion in 1997. At the same time, the world market for flat panel graphic displays will grow at a CAGR of 13.4% to $21.6 billion in 2003 from $10.2 billion in 1997. The LCD technology will dominate the flat panel display market, largely due to the rapidly expanding demand for portable products that need smaller, low power, flat-thin displays. Flat panels will increase their share of the market from 33% in 1997 to 45% in 2003. n
Acknowledgment
This article is an excerpt from Stanford Resources Inc.`s Monitor Market Trends 1997 report.
Joseph A. Castellano is president and CEO of Stanford Resources Inc., 3150 Almaden Expressway, Suite 255, San Jose, CA 95118; ph 408/448-4440, fax 408/448-4445.