SEOUL - Though prices for smaller flat-screen displays could rise this year, big-screen TV prices are set for a prolonged slide as a battle rages between liquid crystal and plasma display standards.
Consumer tech giants such as Sony and LG Electronics are sacrificing profit for market share, analysts say. "Above all, price will be the most important factor when it comes to who will win the battle between plasma and LCD for big flat-screen TVs," said UFJ Tsubasa Securities analyst Kazuya Yamamoto.
Over the past year, prices of both have fallen sharply. A 42-inch plasma TV set using high-definition technology, which is widely expected to emerge as a global broadcast standard, currently sells for around $4,000, while the same size LCD costs about $5,000, according to Samsung Electronics and LG. A less hi-tech 42 inch plasma set can be bought for $2,000.
"LCD makers will need to add new generation lines faster than originally planned to meet the aggressive plasma pricing," Lehman Brothers said.
Analysts say the price of a 32 inch LCD set should drop another 40 percent to around $1,430 to grab more customers.
LCDs last longer than plasma screens but are not as bright, while energy-hungry plasma screens have a wider viewing angle but can require noisy fans to keep them cool.
In the medium term, plasma appears to have the edge in prices for big-screen TVs but huge LCD investment plans could change the picture. "As LCD prices come down, they will manage to beat out plasma in the 40-inch area in 2007 and 2008. We will see a cut-throat price war between the two competing technologies next year.
DisplaySearch, a research group, says that by 2008, plasma will account for 73 percent of the global market for 40-inch or larger flat TVs.
LG Electronics, Samsung SDI, Panasonic products maker Matsushita Electric Industrial and Pioneer Corp. are betting on plasma technology. "We expect production costs to drop by some 20 percent with the introduction of a new technology called 'single scanning' that halves the number of driver chips required to display images on the screen," said G.W. Kim, a spokesman at LG Electronics.
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