Lcd Tv Consumer Reports

Believe it or not, it's nearly 30 years since the first LCD display rolled off the Sharp production line. Back in 1973 it was calculators that were the focus of Sharp's business. Now it's just about any technologies that require a display screen.

Fax machines, photocopiers, microwave ovens and, now, 2.5G GPRS mobile phones are all areas for Sharp-branded LCD products. In addition, the company has an important OEM business, manufacturing LCD displays for companies such as Nintendo (it produces the Gameboy screens).

But it's the growing LCD TV market where the company hopes to make the greatest impact over the coming years. "We have become the number one manufacturer of LCD TVs in the Japanese market, something we couldn't possibly have achieved in CRT," explains Sharp's president Katsuhiko Machida. "We expect LCD to replace CRT in Japan by 2005," he adds.

It's still early days to see whether this growth will be mirrored outside of Japan. Last year the company sold 440,000 LCD TV screens worldwide, but three quarters of them were in Japan. This year it hopes the figure will increase to one million units, rising to three million by 2005--though again the vast majority will be in the Far East. "We don't expect LCD to take over from CRT in Europe until at least 2006," admits Mr Machida.

Competition from rival technologies, such as plasma, in the big screen market and the high costs of LCD production compared to CRT are both potential problems for Sharp. Of the 38% of homes in Japan that currently have a flat screen, 23% have chosen plasma and 15% have opted for LCD.

However, as in Europe, LCD TVs have tended to focus on smaller screen sizes (typically below 30in) while plasma TVs in Japan are considerably cheaper than in the UK. A 42in plasma model typically retails for less than 4,000 [pounds sterling] in the Akihabara region of Tokyo--the Japanese equivalent of the Tottenham Court Road. That's around half its UK price.

At the CEATEC show in Tokyo in October, Sharp announced two versions of a 37in LCD display that it is hoping will enable the company to compete head to head with plasma. Set to launch in the next couple of months, the LC-37BD5 is a standard model with a price tag of around 5,000 [pounds sterling] while the LC-37BT5 features a 5.1 channel Dolby Digital amplifier and 150 watts of audio power and is expected to set customers' back around 6,000 [pounds sterling].

At these prices, it's no wonder LCD TVs remain a luxury item in the UK--the preserve of homes that don't mind paying a premium for products that look nice but are technologically no better than conventional CRT screens.

But Sharp is hoping to address the cost issue to make the sets more appealing to the ordinary consumer. "We plan to reduce LCD costs by half by around 2004/2005," says Mr Machida. He claims by the time the company's state of the art Kameyama plant is built in 2004, increased efficiencies will help to bring the cost of LCDs down to around 70 [pounds sterling] an inch.

This would make the current 37in LCD model a more reasonably priced 2,600 [pounds sterling].

With regard to quality, Sharp's manager of LCD digital systems division, Takahi Tateno, says there are three main areas the company is concentrating on: increased response time, improved viewing angle and improved contrast.

"Of these, improved response time is most important and we have already halved that from 16 to 8 milliseconds," claims Mr Tateno.

Reassuringly for dealers, Sharp believes that the independent sector will continue to play a particularly important role in selling the latest LCD screens.

Says Sharp's group general manager of the International Business Group, Buheita Fujiwara: "They are much more skilled for products like LCD TVs which need to explained to customers. In the UK around 50% of our business is currently through the independent sector."

LOOK TO THE FUTURE

While most of Sharp's focus surrounds the current generation of LCD TVs, the company is working on several new and interesting technologies to ensure its future development.

One of the most important is System LCD. Unlike today's amorphous silicon LCD screens, System LCD uses revolutionary Continuous Grain Silicon (CGS) which, the company claims, gives even higher resolution than CRT.

Aimed at mobile equipment applications, such as digital cameras and cellular phones, System LCD screens also enable peripheral circuits and elements to be mounted on the LCD panel itself, rather than housed in separate units as they are at present. Inevitably this will result in much smaller, thinner display units that consume less power.

Another technology that has come out of Sharp's R&D plant in Oxford, are 3D TV screens. Recently demonstrated in Japan were new generation screens showing specially adapted 3D games. Sharp is currently talking to a number of companies about 3D technology which could eventually be implemented into gaming units (Sharp is a major supplier of conventional Gameboy screens).

In Japan Sharp also recently demonstrated a number of LCD screens with MPEG4 decoders built-in as for one touch video recording on to a memory card. It also showed air purifiers that use the company's Plasmacluster ion air purification technology.

Sharp claims this technology can help to knock out airborne viruses, including influenza, by releasing identical numbers of positive and negative ions into the air. Plasmacluster products are expected in the UK market next year.

COPYRIGHT 2002 DMG World Media Ltd.
COPYRIGHT 2002 Gale Group

Get Skiing &Snowboarding Packages. - Sponsored Link
Ad - View Package Specials &Book Now!