Hailed 18 months ago as the breakthrough TV technology that would catapult Sony into a dominant position in the TV display market, OLED TV is now turning into a lemon for the Japanese TV maker who in Australia has seen their TV display market share savaged by Samsung.
Also in Australia, Sony is struggling with several other products with the company recently admitting that they have had to replace faulty Sony Walkman and Vaio Notebooks that are prone to melting.
In an admission to the Wall Street Journal, Sony has said that they are set to delay the launch of its next organic light emitting diode, or OLED, television because mass producing the new ultrathin displays would exacerbate losses at its TV division.
In Australia, the company is trying to sell a tiny 11" OLED TV for $6,999 which is $2,000 more than some vendors are selling a 55" Full HD TV for, complete with a free Nintendo Wii gaming console.
Sony, who have admitted that they have never made a profit selling their Bravia LCD TV's are on track to lose money for the sixth straight year in their TV division.
Both LG and Samsung are now set to have large screen OLED TV's on sale before Sony. LG is planning a 15" OLED TV monitor by Christmas. say insiders. Samsung has already shown a full working 31" OLED TV at the 2009 CES show.
In previous ChannelNews stories we reported that Sony Chief Executive Howard Stringer had said in May 2008 that Sony would have a 27-inch OLED television available within 12 months.
