The latest Quarterly Global TV Shipment and Forecast Report published by DisplaySearch has shown that TV shipments fell globally for the first time in six years in 2011. The California-based market research firm began tracking global television shipments back in 2004, and last year was the first time that worldwide shipments dropped since this monitoring started.
 |
| Global TV shipments fell for the first time in 6 years |
According to the report, global TV shipments fell by 0.3 percent last year to 247.7 million units. The figures also revealed that when it came to LCD TV shipments last year there was an increase of 7 percent, taking the number of units to 205 million. However, this represented a significant slowdown compared to previous years, when growth was in double digits.
The data showed that global plasma TV shipments suffered their biggest decline on record, falling by almost 7 percent last year to 17.2 million units. CRT TV shipped globally in 2011 fell by a massive 34 percent, and despite the fact that LCD television global shipments did increase last year, the level of growth was not sufficient to offset the declines seen in other areas. Shipment levels for the fourth quarter of last year were down by 4 percent year on year, dropping to 74.2 million units.
Paul Gagnon, director of North America TV research at DisplaySearch, said that there were numerous reasons for the sluggish demand for HDTV displays last year, adding that the results had been “well below industry expectations”. He explained that excessive inventory levels in the early part of the year in both the European and United States markets was partly to blame, as was the sharp drop in demand in Japan, which followed a surge in replacement TV activity in 2009 and 2010 as a result of the government-sponsored Eco-Points programme.