LG.Philips LCD

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LG.Philips LCD (hangul:엘지필립스엘씨디, LG필립스LCD) was formed as a joint venture by the Korean electronics company LG Electronics and the Dutch company Koninklijke Philips Electronics in 1999 to manufacture active matrix LCD.

LG.Philips LCD and Samsung Electronics are in a heated competiton to be the number one supplier of LCD displays; they were each credited with a 22% share of this market as of April 2006.

The company has seven manufacturing plants in Gumi and Paju, South Korea. It also has a module assembly plant in Nanjing, China, and plans to build two more plants in Guangzhou, China and Wroclaw, Poland. Reuters reported on August 18, 2006 that LG.Philips LCD had decided against building a new 8th Generation plant and to build a 5.5 Generation plant instead. This, according to LG.Philips LCD vice president Bock Kwon, is to focus on more lucrative LCD monitor panels for desktop and notebook computers.

LG.Philips LCD became an independent company in 2005 when it was concurrently listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: LPL) and the South Korean Stock Exchange (KRX: 034220). Currently LG owns approximately 37% of the company and Philips owns 32.9%. On August 17, 2006 the Wall Street Journal reported that in an e-mail to customers Merrill Lynch said that Philips was seeking buyers, including Japan's Matsushita, for its stake in LG.Philips LCD.

Philips is Europe's largest manufacturer of LCD TVs and LG is Korea's second largest manufacturer. In March of 2006, LG-Philips produced the (at that moment) largest LCD panel, with a diagonal size of 100 inches (about 2.2 meters). The company has not yet released plans to use 100-inch panels in commercial products.

LG-Philips currently produce the Apple Cinema LCD Panel as well as the Dell Ultrasharp 2005FPW and 30 inch LCD panel.