Korean and Chinese Companies Outcompete... Japanese OLED Company Bankruptcy

Debt Scale of 330 Billion KRW

JOLED, a Japanese organic light-emitting diode (OLED) panel manufacturer, has ultimately declared bankruptcy after being overwhelmed by the display market downturn and competition from Korean and Chinese companies.

On the 28th, major local media including Nihon Keizai Shimbun (Nikkei) reported that JOLED filed for bankruptcy protection at the Tokyo District Court the previous day.

With total debts amounting to 33.7 billion yen (approximately 334.4 billion KRW), JOLED will withdraw from manufacturing and sales operations. It plans to close two business sites and lay off about 280 employees in the manufacturing sector. A basic agreement has been signed for Japan Display (JDI) to take over the technology and development division, which consists of about 100 employees.

Unable to overcome high production costs, JOLED was launched in 2015 by integrating the OLED businesses of Sony and Panasonic at a time when most major Japanese companies were almost completely withdrawing from the OLED business around 2014.

Although it aimed to catch up with Korean and Chinese OLED companies, JOLED’s situation gradually worsened due to disadvantages in price competitiveness and other factors. Despite surviving through external funding, the market downturn led it to proceed with bankruptcy procedures.