South Korea’s global TV market share exceeds 50% in Q1

Domestic TV makers have had a combined market share of over 50% for the first time in the global television market.

According to market research firm Omdia on Tuesday, Samsung Electronics kept its No.1 position in the global TV market with a market share of 32.4% (based on revenue) in the first quarter, up 3.0 percentage points from the same period last year. The South Korean tech giant broke its previous record of 32.3% in the fourth quarter of last year.

Samsung’s strong sales performance was driven by over 40% market share in major markets, such as North America and Europe. It took up a market share of 42.6% in North America and 41.1% in Europe. Samsung’s market share in North America was up 5.8 percentage points from 36.8% year-on-year in the first quarter of the year.

Industry experts cited the tech giant’s strategy that focused on big-screen models with a price tag of over 25 million dollars, such as QLED TVs as a key reason behind its strong sales. Samsung Electronics accounted for 48.8% in the TV market over 25 million dollars and 50.4% in the super-size TV market.

Meanwhile, LG Electronics came in second with a market share of 18.7%, up 2.2 percentage points from a year earlier. Japan’s Sony ranked third with 7.1% market share followed by China’s TCL (6.4%) and Hisense (6.1%). LG Electronics plans to adopt a two-track strategy, focusing on NANO cell TVs in the liquid crystal display (LCD) market and expanding the lineup in the organic light emitting diodes (OLED) market, including Gallery Design TVs and 48-inch models.

South Korea’s share in the global TV market rose 2.6 percentage points from 48.5% in the fourth quarter last year to 51.1% in the first quarter of this year. South Korea has widened the gap with China (21.2%) and Japan (14.3%), with the market share of the two rival countries shrinking slightly in the same period.

The global TV market has shrunk significantly from a year earlier in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. The overall TV market in the first quarter dwindled to 20.59 billion dollars, down by 17.9% from a year earlier. The overall market shipment also declined by 10.2% to 46.5 million units.


Dong-Jun Heo hungry@donga.com