Huawei is reportedly teaming up with foundry house SMIC to develop display driver ICs, a move which may undercut the dominant position that Taiwan's LCD driver IC suppliers have enjoyed in the segment in China, according to industry sources.

Huawei has set up a new business department assigned to develop and market China's homegrown driver ICs, said the sources.

Hisilicon Technologies, a chipset arm of Huawei, has moved in tandem with the parent company for the development of driver IC parts and is reportedly ready to enter trial production of its OLED driver chips, the sources added.

Huawei has stressed that the move is to raise the self-sufficiency rate of related driver ICs so that China can reduce its reliance on imported products, which are currently outsourced mainly to Taiwan-based makers.

It noted earlier that BOE Technology purchases about CNY6 billion (US$864.89 million) worth of LCD driver ICs a year, of which homegrown items account for below 5%.

China now serves as a major production site for LCD panels globally and its demand for LCD driver ICs has reached an economy of scale, said the sources, noting that the technological barriers are also not high for production of driver chips.

Taiwan's LCD driver IC specialists, including Novatek Microelectronics, could have their businesses affected by Huawei's entrance into the segment, said the sources.

Novatek has forecast that it expects its revenues to grow 7.5-10.7% sequentially in the third quarter of 2020, after seeing its revenues hit a record high of NT$18.61 billion (US$632.61 million) in the previous quarter.

By: DocMemory
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