LG Display transferring OLED equipment to different plants to meet Apple demand
Firm to move tensioners from Gumi to Paju plant Move likely for production of IT OLED panels to be used in iPads
LG Display was currently shifting some of its OLED production equipment at its E5 line at its plant in Gumi, South Korea to its plant in Paju, TheElec has learned.
The company was transferring some of its tensioners __ used in depositing OLED materials on the panel during production __ to its E6-4 line at its P10 plant in Paju, sources said.
The tensioner is used in Gen 6 (1500x1850mm) OLED panel production. It is used to pull and fix in place the fine metal masks, which are used to align the red, green and blue organic materials during the deposition process.
The shift of some of the production equipment that were currently in use to another production line rarely happens, the sources said.
This is because the equipment could be damaged during transportation, they said, while they also needed to be calibrated strictly for their specific production lines.
LG Display is likely doing so in preparation for the production OLED panels that Apple plans to use for future iPad models, they said.
The company had been planning to manufacture the panels at its E6-4 line. The panels require high resolution, which needs multiple tensioners to achieve.
The move will allow LG Display to save cost by using its existing tensioners.
The E5 line was also suffering from lower-than-expected operation rate. The line manufactures OLED panels for automotive and wearable applications. The demand for these applications is facing uncertainty due to supply chain issues caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The pandemic has also caused difficulty to manufacturers in producing their production equipment and raw materials in time.
In August last year, LG Display it plans to spend 3.3 trillion won up to 2024 to expand the production capacity of its Paju plant.
The plant already houses E6-1 and E6-2 lines that manufacture OLED panels for iPhones. LG Display is building another line, E6-3, to do the same. All three lines are for flexible OLED panels, while E6-4 line is planning to manufacture rigid OLED panels. Each line has a capacity of 15,000 Gen 6 substrates per month.