SEOUL, April 21 (AJP) - South Korea’s premium OLED champion Samsung Display has reasserted itself as Apple Inc.’s primary iPhone panel supplier, staging a decisive comeback against Chinese rivals and tightening its grip on the high-end display market as Apple prepares to enter the foldable era.
Samsung Display sharply expanded its share of Apple’s iPhone OLED supply chain in 2025, helped by production setbacks at China’s BOE and a reported three-year exclusive deal to supply panels for Apple’s first foldable iPhone.
According to market tracker Omdia, Samsung Display accounted for 56.8 percent of Apple’s iPhone display procurement in 2025, up from 49.1 percent a year earlier. Shipments rose about 15 percent to 141.6 million units from 122.3 million in 2024, widening the gap again with LG Display and BOE after competition had briefly tightened the previous year.
The surge translated directly into earnings. Samsung Display posted 9.5 trillion won ($6.6 billion) in fourth-quarter revenue and 2.0 trillion won in operating profit for the October–December period of 2025. For the full year, the display unit reported 29.8 trillion won in revenue and 4.1 trillion won in operating profit.
For the first quarter, operating profit is projected at around 1 trillion won—roughly halved from the previous quarter but doubled from a year earlier during the typically slow season of the January–March period.
The turnaround was driven in part by a technological inflection point. As Apple expanded the use of low-temperature polycrystalline oxide (LTPO) OLED panels across its latest iPhone lineup to improve power efficiency, BOE struggled to meet Apple’s stringent yield and quality thresholds. The bottleneck effectively pushed the Chinese supplier into a secondary role, allowing Samsung to capture incremental volume while strengthening its pricing power.
"Apple’s quality standards are exceptionally high," said Kim Hyun-jae, a professor of electrical and electronic engineering at Yonsei University. "Because the latest LTPO technology is highly difficult and takes time to master, BOE had to step in as a secondary vendor for lower-tier products rather than premium models."
Samsung’s lead is now set to deepen further. Industry reports indicate Apple has tapped Samsung Display as the sole OLED supplier for its first foldable iPhone for an initial three-year period—a move that underscores the still-wide gap in foldable panel durability, crease control and yield stability.
"Apple initially hesitated to enter the foldable market, but currently, Samsung Display is the only manufacturer capable of producing what they need," Professor Kim noted. "Samsung possesses significant accumulated know-how from producing its own Galaxy Fold series."
The reported exclusivity highlights a broader structural divide. While China dominates global LCD capacity, Korea continues to command the premium OLED segment, where margins are higher and technological barriers remain steep. Each time Chinese players narrow the gap in one generation, Korean firms have moved ahead with the next.
"For about a decade, observers have warned that China would soon catch up, but the gap is constantly being maintained," Kim added. "While China is number one in overall volume like LCDs, Korea is still number one in the premium products that actually generate profit."
To sustain that edge, Samsung Display is accelerating its next manufacturing leap. The company is ramping up the world’s first 8.6-generation OLED production line in Asan, South Chungcheong Province, with mass production targeted this year. The larger substrate size—2,250 by 2,600 millimeters—is expected to lower unit costs and reduce material waste, reinforcing a structural cost advantage that rivals will struggle to replicate.
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