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Samsung-Sony venture starts $1.5b LCD line

Wednesday, 3 June 2009


SEOUL, June 2 (Reuters ): A flat-screen joint venture between Samsung Electronics Co Ltd and Sony Corp said on Tuesday it began volume production at a new manufacturing facility that took $1.5 billion to build.
The five-year old venture, named S-LCD, said in a statement that the new production line would use larger "eighth-generation" panels for TV brands including Samsung and Sony.
Sales of flat-screen TVs have remained healthy in the midst of the global downturn thanks to sharp price falls over the past year. Panel makers have been stepping up output as prices stablise, while China's policy of subsidising electronics purchases in rural areas has boosted demand.
S-LCD invested 1.8 trillion won in the new line, its second 8G facility located south of Seoul. It said it would ramp up monthly production capacity to 70,000 glass sheets by year-end.