Samsung is the largest vendor of televisions in the world, and it has held the top spot for 12 consecutive years now. In spite of the stiff competition from LG in the premium TV segment, Samsung continues to be the market leader globally. It took Samsung years of hard work and many innovations to become a market leader in the TV space.
In a blog post accompanied by a detailed infographic, Samsung has listed down all its major TV innovations from 2006 to the current year. While some of these are genuine innovations, others are just marketing tricks.
Samsung made the world's first OLED TV
The premium design of the ‘wine glass-inspired’ Bordeaux LCD TV in 2006 was a major success for Samsung with more than a million units in sales. The company also introduced the world’s first edge-lit LED TV in 2009 which was one-third thinner than most TVs then. The list goes on with the world’s first 3D LED TV in 2010, the world's first curved UHD TV in 2014, and so on.
The most interesting entry in the list, however, is world’s first OLED TV in 2013. As some of you may be aware, Samsung stopped making OLED TVs a couple of years ago and started selling QLED TVs instead. On the other hand, Samsung’s main rival, LG, made long-term bets on OLED TVs and is now reaping the benefits in the premium TV segment.
While Samsung is selling QLED TVs for now, the long-term plan is to shift to the superior MicroLED panels to gain a competitive advantage over OLED TVs. Samsung showcased its first MicroLED TV at CES 2018 earlier this year, but it is not yet available for purchase. If and when Samsung publishes the next infographic on its major TV innovations, expect the world's first Micro LED TV to be on the list.
