Following a decline in 2012, global TV market won’t recover until 2015.
Television market hits a wall in 2012
The TV market had been undergoing a slowdown prior to 2012, with shipments rising by 11.6 percent in 2010 and decelerating to 1 percent in 2011. By the beginning of this decade, most consumers in developed regions already had replaced their old cathode-ray tube (CRT) sets with flat-panel models, and many buyers in emerging economies had also made the switch. Combined with economic factors, and with issues related to government subsidies and the analog transition, the slowdown of the flat-panel replacement trend contributed to the major downturn in 2012.
The North American and Western European regions in 2012 both experienced significant shipment declines. Meanwhile, growth stalled in Latin America, the Middle East, Africa and the Asia-Pacific region. Eastern Europe and China were the only regions to continue to enjoy rising shipments
The biggest reduction occurred in Japan, where shipments fell by 13.5 million units in 2012, accounting for the vast majority of the global decline of 16.0 million.
Point shaving
The decline in Japan was due to the end of the country’s “eco-points” subsidy program. Starting in mid-2009, the program gave consumers points for buying energy-efficient products—such as light-emitting diode (LED)-backlit LCD TVs. These points could then be redeemed to buy other items.
Between 2009 and 2011, eco-points generated an additional 25 million television sets sold in the Japanese market. With the revocation of this artificial stimulus, demand declined in 2012, and the Japanese TV market will continue to be severely affected for the next five years.
