According to the monitoring data of retailmarket which issued by the Department of State Information Center, occupyingChinese 375 major cities ranging the first level from the fourth level, theforeign-investing plasma TV brands have a 44.39% market share over the firsthalf of this year, which decreased by 30% compared with the same period in thelast year. As for the brands of China-made plasma TV, the overall market shareincreased by 29.99% from the first half of last year to the same period of thisyear which is indicated by 55.61%.

 Over the first half of this year, the mostdistinguished feature of Chinese plasma TV market is the popularity of 32 inchplasma TV.

 Cai Ying, head of the Department of StateInformation Center, stated to CBN that over the first half of this year theplasma TV had trends of “smaller screen becomes popular”, which is greatlydifferent from the LCD TV’s trend of “larger screen becomes fast-developing”.Starting from the beginning of this year, China-made brands has been concentratingon inventing and promoting 32 inch plasma TV according to the changing requirein the domestic market. Due to the modest price and better definition of rapidmovement picture than common LCD TV, the product was sold well once it waspromoted.

 On one hand, in the first half of lastyear, although 32 inch plasma TV occupied 0.12% of the plasma TV’s overallsales, the proportion rocketed to 43.62% in the same period of this year. Onthe other hand, the sales proportion of 42 and 50 inch plasma TV which wereconventionally advantageous dropped dramatically, especially the 42 inch onewhich fell to 35.22%. Cai Ying indicated that market share of foreign-investingbrands have been reduced under the condition of 4-percent sales boom of 32 inchplasma TV since the China-made brands play a main role in  Chinese 32 inch plasma TV market while theforeign-investing brands mainly focus on 42 and 50 inch.

 Accordingto the list named “Top Ten Sales for Plasma TV in the First Half Year of 2008”issued by the Department of State Information Center, Panasonic, which remaineda brand leader in Chinese plasma TV market for years, was surpassed by HITACHIand CHANGHONG and finally fell to No.3 in the first half of this year. WhileSAMSUNG dropped to No.9, other foreign-investing brands like PHILIPS, SANYO,LG, and so forth were out of the Top Ten List. Yesterday, Li Mingxu, head ofthe Marketing Department for Color TV products in Chinese headquarter ofSAMSUNG Electronics, admitted to the reporter that it is a fact that SAMSUNGplasma TV’s market share in the first half of this year had been reduced since 32inch products are not available to SAMSUNG, and it was believed that themarketing capacity for plasma TV in China would be lower than LCD 

TV. Therefore, SAMSUNG concentrated on the productionof LCD TV. In addition to this, Cai Ying also revealed that it could be seenfrom the Top Ten branding structure that Japanese brands represented by HITACHIand Panasonic, and Korean brands represented by SAMSUNG and LG, declined to20.59% and 10.39% respectively as for their market shares.

 Thanks to the increase of China-made brands’market shares, many China-made brands including CHANGHONG (NO.2), Hisense,KONKA, Haier, Skyworth, XOCECO PRIMA, SVA, jump to the Top Ten List and theirmarket shares increased. They have formed a China-made Brands Group which isled by CHANGHONG. Su Zihuan, General Manager from CHANGHONG Multimedia (China)Marketing Co. Ltd., considers that the pricing campaign in the field of plasmaTV is not as drastic as that of LCD TV, then more and more China-made brandscommence on committing to produce and sell plasma TV which has higher grossmargin. For the fact that foreign-investing brands concentrate on products withbigger sizes, their products for 32 inch and 37 inch are obviously in shortage;besides, China-made brands’ plasma TV has selling advantage in the channel ofthree and four grade- marketplace. All of these factors contribute to the boomof China-brands’ overall market shares in the plasma TV market.