Folding screen mobile phones are on the eve of an explosion.
At the end of 2021, folding screen mobile phones of domestic brands will be released together; At the recent MWC 2022, mobile phone exhibitors such as TCL, oppo and glory also showed their own folding screen mobile phones or concept products. Vivo will also release its first folding screen mobile phone in the near future.
According to the data provided by DSCC, a screen supply chain consulting company, the shipment of folding screen mobile phones reached 2.6 million in the third quarter of 2021, reaching a record high. In addition, according to the latest report of IDC, the global shipment of folding screen mobile phones reached 7.1 million units in 2021, an increase of 264.3% over the shipment of 1.9 million units in 2020.
Although the industry is optimistic about the future of folding screen, there are still many problems to be solved.
The reporter of new consumption daily found that the folding screen mobile phones in offline brand stores are indeed hot. Folding screen mobile phones that have been on the market for a long time basically do not need to make an appointment and can be taken by the store. However, products just launched, such as oppo find and glory Magic V, are still out of stock in a short time.
“The demand for folding screen has been very strong since it came into the market. We now have full pre-sale online, and basically have to wait 21 days to a month.”. Recently, Zhao Ming, CEO of glory, said in an interview with new consumer daily that although there are more black swans in the supply chain this year and it will be tense for some time, glory and suppliers will still do their best to improve supply.
The information obtained by the reporter from mobile phone manufacturers and supply chains shows that at present, the relevant technologies of folding screen are becoming more and more mature, and the cost of unit parts is also decreasing step by step. Software and hardware adaptation will be an important challenge for folding screen mobile phones.
folding screen is hot, and new products are still “hard to find”
Through the interview, the reporter found that the folding screen mobile phones that have been on the market for a long time basically do not need to make an appointment. They can pick up the goods on the spot, and even “group purchase” multiple sets, and some models have discounts.
“Dozens of sets were sold years ago, and there is no problem in supply. You can buy Wuxi Online Offline Communication Information Technology Co.Ltd(300959) whatever you want,” the salesperson at Xidan Grandjoy Holdings Group Co.Ltd(000031) Huawei counter told reporters. “If you buy our P50 pocket in bulk, we can give you a discount.”
Huawei P50 pocket
Another brand without supply problems is Samsung. “We sold more than 20 W22 and more than 10 fold last month,” the salesperson at the Samsung counter told reporters. “The new machines were out of stock when they were on the market. But now they are well stocked, and we have five machines in the warehouse. If you want to get more mobile phones, you need to tell me a few days in advance and we will transfer them to you.”
Samsung Galaxy W22 5g
There are only some folding screen mobile phones just released, which are difficult to buy directly from offline stores. According to the shopkeeper, oppo has been out of stock for more than 3 months.
“We have sold more than 200 products since last December (when the products were just launched). We will sell out every time we replenish them,” said the salesperson of oppo mobile phone. “Now there are only a few black top matching find n in the store, which has been out of stock before.”
The same is true for another glory Magic V released in January. The reporter learned that Xidan stores have stopped making appointments at present.
“There are more than 80 customers in the front row,” the salesperson of glory store told reporters that there is no stock. “This is a relatively normal situation. It is difficult to say that this is not the heat of the brand (folding screen mobile phone), but it is expected that Magic V will not need to make an appointment and buy it at any time in a month or two.”
Glory Magic V
On the whole, the relatively popular folding screen mobile phones, such as oppo find and glory Magic V, tend to have relatively low prices except for their short listing time. Compared with the folding screen mobile phones of Huawei and Samsung, they have higher cost performance.
Obviously, the folding screen mobile phone in 2022 is no longer a “flower of kaolin”, and the price has even fallen to the pricing of some high-end mobile phones. At present, the main reason is that the technology of manufacturers and supply chain enterprises is becoming more and more mature and the cost of unit parts is reduced.
flexible screen: the “Facade” of folding screen
With the increasing shipments of folding screen mobile phones, mobile phone manufacturers have contributed to the growth of flexible AMOLED industry chain together with supply chain enterprises smelling opportunities out of their own brand and sales demand.
Samsung is the largest AMOLED screen supplier in the industry. AMOLED flexible screen provided by Samsung is applied to most folding screen mobile phones on the market.
This includes both oppo find n series, Samsung’s two folding screen mobile phones Galaxy Z fold series and Galaxy Z flip series, and Xiaomi’s mix fold Among them, the latest Galaxy Z fold3 5g and Galaxy Z flip3 5g adopt Samsung’s latest generation AMOLED flexible screen, which has the characteristics of 120Hz dynamic refresh rate.
At present, the enterprises with flexible AMOLED in China are mainly BOE, Visionox Technology Inc(002387) , shentianma, Ruoyu technology, Tcl Technology Group Corporation(000100) Huaxing optoelectronics. Among them, both Rouyu technology and BOE have shipped mass-produced mobile phones.
BOE is the exclusive supplier of Huawei mate XS and mate x flexible folding screen mobile phones. At present, BOE has three sixth generation flexible AMOLED production lines, which are located in Mianyang, Chengdu and Chongqing respectively. In 2020, the shipment of flexible AMOLED products achieved a breakthrough, the annual shipment volume increased by more than 100% year-on-year, and the market share ranked the top two in the world.
Relevant data show that the overall shipment of BOE flexible AMOLED continued to increase in 2021. About 40 million pieces were shipped in the first three quarters of 2021, with a significant year-on-year growth. After entering the third quarter, the situation continued to be good.
In addition, Visionox Technology Inc(002387) also publicly disclosed that the yield and productivity of Kunshan generation 5.5 production line and Gu’an generation 6 flexible screen production line were further improved, and the products were continuously delivered to first-line brand customers; In addition, the 6th generation flexible AMOLED production line in Hefei and the flexible module line in Zengcheng, Guangzhou have achieved mass production and delivery to brand customers, and the production capacity has climbed steadily.
liquid metal material is expected to be the future choice of hinge
Hinge is the key functional component of foldable mobile phone, and its structure is complex. The hinge applied to the folding screen smartphone not only needs to have a opening and closing life of at least 100000 times, but also needs to have the characteristics of light weight, small size and strong stability. Its manufacturing process covers the processing and assembly of a variety of precision structural parts. It can be seen from the patents of Huawei and SamSung that the hinge is composed of hundreds of precision components.
According to the person in charge of oppo find n product to the new consumption daily, oppo find n has gone through four years, iterated six generations of products, applied for 840 patents and authorized more than 230 invention patents. “Light hinge has 125 patents.”
At present, both Samsung, Huawei and oppo have chosen the path of technology self-development, and the research and development of optical hinge has started for at least two years.
“Our products are considered not only in terms of durability and robustness, but also in terms of materials,” the product director of Samsung told reporters that the metal parts on the fuselage are made of self-developed “armored aluminum”, which not only ensures durability, but also reduces the weight of the fuselage.
Previously, the galaxy Z series folding screen mobile phone released by Samsung not only achieved hinge folding, but also achieved ipx68 level waterproof. This not only depends on the design of mechanical structure, but also needs to introduce new waterproof materials.
Based on these requirements, liquid metal materials are expected to become the best choice. Liquid metal has the comprehensive characteristics of solid, metal and glass. It has the characteristics of high hardness, corrosion resistance and high wear resistance. The bending strength, tensile strength and elastic deformation are better than those of common materials. In terms of production process, metal injection molding (MIM) technology, which has a wide range of materials, a high degree of automation, and can realize the mass production of complex parts at a low cost, is the most ideal technology at present.
utg cover sector: the key to wear resistance and flexibility of folding screen mobile phone
The screen cover material of folding screen mobile phone is another factor related to the experience of folding screen mobile phone.
Previously, the first generation of folding screen Galaxy fold and Huawei mate x used CPI (colorless polyimide), which is essentially a colorless and transparent plastic. Compared with the glass cover, it is lighter and easy to fold. More importantly, CPI can be mass produced on a large scale.
However, CPI has a fatal disadvantage – its hardness and durability are not ideal. This is why the screen of the first generation Galaxy fold and mate x will inevitably be scratched, yellow or even broken after being used for a period of time.
Until the emergence of Samsung’s second-generation folding screen mobile phone Galaxy Z flip. This product selects UTG (ultra thin glass) on the cover sector of the screen. This material has both the hardness of glass and certain toughness.
After that, Samsung’s two folding screen mobile phones Galaxy Z fold3 5g, Galaxy Z flip3 5g and the latest oppo find n all use UTG supplied by Schott glass In fact, in addition to Schott, Corning, another glass supplier giant, is also working with Samsung to jointly establish a UTG supply chain.
At present, apart from Schott glass and Corning, the only enterprise with the ability to provide original UTG glass is Triumph Science & Technology Co.Ltd(600552) Triumph Science & Technology Co.Ltd(600552) in 2020, it has realized the only domestic production technology of “formulation development, production, UTG thinning, UTG forming and flexible bonding” for a full set of ultra-thin flexible glass in China.
This has something to do with Huawei’s preference for Chinese supply chain enterprises. As early as the second half of 2018, Triumph Science & Technology Co.Ltd(600552) has entered Huawei’s mobile phone supply chain, and was disclosed and jointly applied for a flexible glass processing technology patent in 2021.
In July 2021, Triumph Science & Technology Co.Ltd(600552) the first phase of the project has been completed and put into operation with supply capacity, and UTG phase II project is also under investment and construction.
The entry barrier of UTG industrial chain is mainly reflected in the development of original film technology and heavy capital investment. In addition to Triumph Science & Technology Co.Ltd(600552) , Hemei optics has invested 1.2 billion yuan to build UTG ultra-thin electronic flexible glass production project in Jiangxi Province. Jiangsu Suqian technology, together with South Korea sutsen Co., Ltd., invested 6 billion yuan to build a project with an annual output of 50 million flexible folding screen glass substrates.
hardware and software adaptation is the next challenge
At the 2022 World Mobile conference, Zhao Ming, CEO of glory, once put forward the view that “the folding screen mobile phone market can grow 10 times in 2022”. In his view, folding screen mobile phones, like ordinary mobile phones, will become the mainstream of smart phones.
However, in addition to the mature technology of the supply chain, the problem that the folding screen still needs to solve is the adaptability of software and hardware.
It is worth noting that Google has released an optimized version of Android 12L for folding screen mobile phones, which is expected to be officially launched in the first quarter of this year. The adaptation of the underlying aspects of the system is no longer a problem. The rest is how to let more third parties join the adaptation of individual models.
“The problem of adaptation is indeed a very challenging thing. The workload is four to six times that of ordinary flagship machines.” Liu zuohu, chief product officer of oppo, said, “the application adaptation of the head should be discussed one by one, and their own system applications should be designed separately. Some innovative user experiences need to be redeveloped. The workload is very heavy, and the challenge is greater than the hardware.”
It must be pointed out that the current folding screen mobile phone market is still Samsung’s “world”. According to DSSC data, in the third quarter of 2021, Samsung accounted for 93% of the global market share of foldable smartphones, followed by Huawei, accounting for 6%. The attitude of giants such as apple towards folding screen has not been clear.
However, on the eve of the outbreak of the “folding screen” concept products, as the industrial chain of the core components of the folding screen has become increasingly mature, the major mobile phone brands only need the enterprises in the supply chain to drive full power, so as to realize the ramp up of production capacity. According to the statistics of OLED industry, there are 12 6-generation production lines built and under construction in China, and the total production capacity will exceed 500000 pieces / month after full production.
“Folding screen mobile phones have gone through the era of ‘concept gimmicks’, followed by real function competition.” Jiang Hairong, CMO of glory China, believes that.
