A South Korean business is receiving attention for changing dynamics in large touch-screen markets that are dominated by Taiwanese businesses. Although number of demands for large touch-screens is increasing in laptop, monitor, tablet and other markets, there aren’t many South Korean businesses that are dealing with such demands.
G2Touch is a South Korean business that is located in Pankyo and is distinguishing itself by mass-producing touch-screens for laptops starting from July of last year.
It has supplied touch-screens to global laptop businesses such as Dell, HP, and Samsung Electronics continuously. There are about 30 models already this year that are going to use G2Touch’s screens.
Large touch-screens, which make touch input possible on laptops or monitors, are dominated by Taiwanese businesses such as TPK, HannStar and others. PC and LCD industries have developed evenly in Taiwan, and large touch-screen technologies have also developed together as specialization between big, medium, and small companies have taken place.
However South Korea’s touch-screen industry was centered on small products based on Smartphones. Its interests on large touch-screens were minimal. A reason why G2Touch was able to deal with large touch-screens in South Korea, where infrastructures are lacking, is because it has been building up its own technical skills. Since its establishment in 2009, G2Touch has only focused on touch-screens. It currently has its own sensor patterns, touch IC algorithm, and touch IC.
President Lee Sung-ho of G2Touch is an expert in displays. After joining Samsung Electronics’ LCD Business Department, he was the first one in South Korea to introduce Colored TFT LCD into cellphones. He is the main person to develop a cellphone LCD module, which is also called ‘Lee Kun-hee Phone (Model name: T100)’.
“Based on experiences with T100 project, I have developed an idea of incorporating many advantages of TFT LCD technologies into touch-screens and I was able to develop point-type touch-screens based on this idea.” said President Lee.
A reason why G2Touch has emerged in touch-screen markets is because it has original LCD integral touch-screen technologies.
Display manufacturers tend to apply integral (on-cell and in-cell) touch-screens to implement thinness and high penetration ratio. However they are not receiving integral touch-screens stably due to problems with processes and technologies that are difficult. Because interference (noise) that occurs in LCDs affect touch-screens, they either had to limit resolutions lower than fullHD or use panels that have narrow angle of field.
G2Touch’s technology has low noise even when a distance between touch-sensor patterns and display’s electrode is within a micrometer and it can be used regardless of LCD’s resolution or size because it uses asynchronous operation method. Also it does not require a window glass and it reduces costs and increases level of design since the whole process is very simple.
Samsung has noticed such technical skills and invested in G2Touch. G2Touch had received total of $10 million (about 12 billion KRW) from Samsung Venture Investment Corporation, STIC Investment, Korea Development Bank and others. It currently has partnerships with Samsung Display and Samsung Electronics.
Large touch-screens for laptops that have been mass-produced starting from July of last year are G2Touch’s first product that is mass-produced. They are products that have brought positive performance to G2Touch since its establishment 6 years ago and have brought meaningful sales of $4.57 million (5.5 billion KRW) in second half of last year.
G2Touch is planning to regularize its large touch-screen business this year. By dealing with Taiwanese and Chinese display businesses, it is going to supply its products for laptops and others.
Global laptop markets produce about 200 million laptops per year, and 30% of them will have touch technologies. Forecasts are very positive as Microsoft has released touch input and OS that is suitable for mobiles.
G2Touch is also setting up a plan to enter mobile markets with its LCD integral touch-screen technology.
“Although G2Touch is a small venture company, we have differentiated technical skills as number of registered patents is about 200 and have more patents than other global businesses that focus on touch-screens.” said President Lee Sung-ho. “Our primary goal is to lead in global medium and large-sized touch-screen markets with our own technologies.”
Staff Reporter Yun, Kunil | benyun@etnews.com