SEOUL, Aug. 23 (UPI) -- South Korea's Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics took the top two spots in the first half of this year in the race for global TV market dominance, London-based consultancy Omnia said Tuesday.
In the January-June period, Samsung Electronics held 31.5% of the global market share, up 0.5% from the year before, while LG Electronics remained in second place with 17.4%, down 1.6%.
China's TCL ranked third with 8.7%, its domestic rival Hisense and Japan's Sony rounding out the top five with 8.2% and 7.4% respectively.
Samsung and LG performed especially well in the premium sector, which is composed of TV sets priced $2,500 and higher. Samsung garnered 53.6% of the market segment, followed by LG with 21.5% and Sony with 17.2%.
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LG Electronics, however, outshone its rival Samsung in advanced OLED sales, carving out 62% of the global share for a total sales of 2.74 million units.
According to Omnia, the number of TVs sold worldwide in the first half of this year was 92.6 million units, a 6.6% year-on-year drop, with the total dollar amount plunging 12.5%.
Observers warn of bearishness in the TV sector as people become reluctant to spend more on household electronics with the slowing of the COVID-19 pandemic.
"People stayed a lot at home due to COVID-19 in 2020 and 2021, which resulted in many of them buying new TVs. That kind of demand has weakened substantially. Hence, we can expect global TV sales to be weak for the time being," Seoul-based business tracking firm Leaders Index CEO Park Ju-gun told UPI News Korea.
"One thing to note is the 2022 World Cup that will take place this November and December in Qatar. Home appliance makers hope to take advantage of this event to ship more TVs. How much it will really help to boost demand, however, remains to be seen," he said.
