Industry Warms Up All-round OLED Materials Meet Localization Breakthrough

financial community2024-07-10 14:29

The cyclical recovery of the semiconductor industry, the increase in the rate of growth in the panel industry, the expansion of fab production, led to an increase in the use of upstream organic materials. The photoresist layout of related companies is growing rapidly, and the products are gradually recognized by panel and semiconductor manufacturers. The expansion of the advanced process of integrated circuits and the increase in OLED penetration will continue to enhance the application of domestic OLED materials.

In recent years, personal computer brands have adopted OLED display panels, tablet computers have also shown signs of using OLED display screens, folding mobile phones have gradually gained market recognition, shipments have increased significantly, and the OLED penetration rate of smart phones has continued to rise. Overall shipments of OLED panels in mainland China are high, and organic materials as upstream benefit, with some manufacturers improving their performance in the first half of 2024.

In 2023, the global photoresist market size of $2.351 billion billion, China's panel photoresist, semiconductor photoresist and other high-end products self-sufficiency rate is low, the development is relatively uneven. Among them, the growth rate of ArF photoresist is stronger than the overall, the proportion of the overall photoresist market increased, reflecting the increase in the proportion of China's integrated circuit advanced process, process upgrade and advanced process proportion of the increase in the amount of photoresist unit and unit area value increased.

Domestic manufacturers have photoresist phenolic resin research and development, pilot, mass production, formula evaluation and other a complete set of development and mass production system. Domestic new products cover high-resolution KrF photoresist, deep ultraviolet negative photoresist and chemical amplification I-line photoresist and other categories, the relevant manufacturers are expected to continue to release in 2024, some ArF photoresist products have been certified in downstream customers and sales.

Rapid expansion of OLED demand

In the first quarter of 2024, the overall shipment of OLED panels in mainland China was about 97.8 million, up 55.7 percent year-on-year, and the market share reached 51.8 percent, up 7.4 percentage points from the previous quarter. In 2023, global OLED smartphone shipments reached 0.595 billion units, with a penetration rate of 51%, and the agency predicts that shipments are expected to reach 0.75 billion units, with a penetration rate of 60%, by 2028. Folding mobile phones have a long-term market prospect. It is estimated that shipments in 2024 will rise 18% year on year to 20.6 million units. In 2024-2028, folding screen mobile phones will grow to 53 million units at a compound annual growth rate of 26.8.

At present, Samsung Galaxy, Lenovo, HP, Dell, Asus, Huawei, Paco, Xiaomi and LG have all adopted OLED display panels in their personal computers. Apple will gradually use OLED panels to replace LCD panels in iPad and Mac series, while Apple's market share in tablet and PC will reach 40% and 9% respectively in 2023, apple's layout or is expected to drive the rapid penetration of OLED panels in the field of medium-size display.

OLED panel cost composition of equipment depreciation accounted for the highest proportion, up to 35%, followed by organic materials accounted for 23%. In 2023, OLED organic materials in the Chinese market were 4.3 billion yuan, up 33% year-on-year, and are expected to grow to 9.8 billion yuan in 2030, with a compound growth rate of 11%. In 2023, the demand for Array positive photoresist for display panels in mainland China was about 17000 tons, up about 8% year-on-year, and the localization rate of OLED organic materials was about 38%.

Wright Optoelectronics expects to achieve operating income of 0.241 billion -0.285 billion yuan in the half year of 2024, up 70.32-101.29 percent from the same period last year, and net profit attributable to its parent is expected to grow 85.32 percent to 136.80 percent. The change in performance was mainly due to the significant year-on-year increase in OLED terminal material revenue, as well as the improvement of production efficiency and the strengthening of management. The company has formed an integrated production capacity from OLED intermediates to pre-sublimation materials to end materials.

Upstream Materials Company Performance Growth

Photolithography process can be summarized as coating, exposure, development and other links, photoresist matching reagents are wet chemicals used in the lithography process and photoresist, mainly including tackifier, diluent, edge removal agent, developer, stripping solution and so on. Photoresist according to downstream applications can be divided into PCB, LCD/OLED panel and integrated circuit photoresist, etc., together with the photoresist supporting reagents in the lithography process as consumables, of which the photoresist barrier for integrated circuits is the highest, the growth rate is higher than the overall light growth rate.

PCB photoresists include dry film photoresists, wet film photoresists, and photo-imageable solder resist inks. The photoresist for a panel includes a thin film field effect transistor (TFT) photoresist, a color photoresist, a black photoresist, and a photoresist for a touch screen. Integrated circuit photoresist has experienced the development process from ultraviolet light source to deep ultraviolet light source, and then to extreme ultraviolet light source, including ultraviolet broad spectrum photoresist, g-line photoresist, I-line photoresist, KrF photoresist, ArF photoresist and EUV photoresist.

Resin, monomer, photoinitiator and other raw materials such as high barriers, low localization rate, import difficulty. High-end photoresist on the resin performance requirements, monomer synthesis technology is difficult, the stability, purity requirements are high, photosensitive agent affects the performance of photoresist. The formulation technology of photoresist is complex, the investment in research and development is large, the stability and cleanliness of the product is high, the research and development investment of photoresist manufacturers is high, the lithography equipment is expensive, the import restrictions are high, the photoresist category is many, the client import and verification cycle is long, these factors have become industry barriers. The increase in the proportion of advanced processes and the increase in the number of photolithography have led to an increase in the value of photoresist used per unit area, which is generally expensive.

In recent years, with the gradual maturity of the panel industry chain in mainland China, upstream electronic chemicals and display materials have obtained unprecedented development opportunities, and have formed a mass production scale. Related companies have grown rapidly, and their products have gradually been recognized by panel manufacturers. In 2023, the revenue of Tongcheng new material electronic materials products was 0.554 billion yuan, an increase of 46.88 over the same period last year, and the gross profit margin was 26.32. The company's Beixu electronic display panel photoresist business achieved sales revenue of 0.261 billion billion yuan, up 22.8 percent year-on-year, and sales of panel photoresist products increased 29.8 percent year-on-year, with a domestic market share of about 22.1 percent. Beixu Electronics' main business is the production and sales of positive photoresist for Array in the display panel industry. The existing products are suitable for mainstream panels such as A- Si, LTPS, IGZO and OLED. In 2023, the company made phased progress in AMOLED application market. Its high-resolution photoresist and low-temperature photoresist were mass-produced and sold in major domestic customers respectively. The annual production capacity of Beixu Electronics' Qianjiang Factory increased to 8000 tons.

Affected by factors such as the growth rate of the domestic semiconductor and OLED panel industry, in the first half of 2024, the sales of CMP polishing pads of Dinglong Co., Ltd. increased significantly, the core and upstream raw materials of the products were mass produced independently, the fixed cost was diluted, and the net profit increased year on year. The total sales of CMP polishing liquid and cleaning liquid products were about 0.077 billion yuan, up 190.87 year on year, of which the sales revenue in the second quarter was about 40.79 million yuan, up 13.56 and 179.13 year. YPI, PSPI and other semiconductor display materials business sales totaled about 0.168 billion yuan, up 234.56 percent year-on-year, of which sales revenue in the second quarter was about 98.25 million yuan, up 39.93 percent month-on-month and 163.69 percent year-on-year.

Photoresist continues to break through

In 2023, China's wafer monthly production capacity totaled 6.5872 million pieces, up 13.8 percent year-on-year, of which 12-inch capacity accounted for 56.9 percent, the main application of photoresist for ArF and KrF. In addition, 8 inches and 6 inches and below wafer capacity accounted for 24.4 and 18.6, respectively, the main application of photoresist is g/I line and KrF glue. In 2023-2027, the proportion of mature process capacity in mainland China will increase from 31% to 39%. Source information pointed out that the mature process relative to the advanced process process process process node is lower, the requirements of the photoresist medium, domestic photoresist manufacturers are expected to seize the opportunity to promote their products into the supply chain.

In 2023, the global photoresist market was $2.351 billion billion, down 10.95 percent from a year earlier. According to statistics, ArF photoresist accounted for 44.28, is the only growth of the domestic market photoresist type, the scale of 0.42 over the same period last year, ArF photoresist market growth and the proportion of the overall photoresist market increased, to a certain extent, reflects the proportion of advanced technology in China's integrated circuit market increased.

In 2023, Jingrui's photoresist revenue was 0.155 billion yuan, up 10.81 percent year-on-year; Shanghai Xinyang photoresist series products have achieved operating income of more than 400 million yuan.

Tongcheng New Material disclosed that its I-line photoresist is close to the international advanced level, covering most of the process requirements of domestic logic and memory production lines. KrF photoresist product sequence continues to improve, market share continues to rise, some products have become the first supplier of domestic leading fab production lines; Some ArF photoresist has passed the product certification of downstream customers in the first quarter of 2024 and is ready to start production in the second quarter of 2024. A number of KrF and I-line photoresists have been verified by leading domestic chip companies and storage plants, and will begin to gradually release in the second quarter of 2024.

Jingrui electric ArF high-end photoresist research and development work in an orderly manner, some samples have been carried out customer sample verification work, Meishan Jingrui 1200 tons of photoresist production line put into production, is still in the production capacity climbing stage. Xuzhou Bokang, a subsidiary of Chinachem Technology, has ArF, KrF and I-line photoresist in client verification, and some models have been supplied to fabs in bulk.

Nantah Optoelectronics focuses on the research and development and industrialization of ArF 193nm photoresist. The photoresist research and development center of its Ningbo holding subsidiary has the ability to develop functional monomers, functional resins, photosensitizers and other photoresist materials, and can realize all autonomy from photoresist raw materials to photoresist products and supporting materials. Currently, the three ArF photoresist products developed have been certified and sold by downstream customers, and many products are being certified by major customers. Ningbo company's sales revenue, ArF photoresist sales accounted for less than 10%, need to further strengthen technology research and development and mass production process improvement.

Dinglong shares have laid out 16 domestic has not yet broken through the mainstream wafer photoresist, including 8 high-end KrF photoresist and 8 immersion ArF photoresist, has completed 7 products of customer samples, the rest of the products are planned to complete customer samples in 2024.

This article is from: Securities Market Weekly.