LG Electronics, the world’s third-largest television maker, said today that its TV-making operation turned its third consecutive quarterly operating profit on a continued increase in demand for its flat-screen TVs.
The South Korea-based company’s digital-display unit’s operating profit was $15 million, compared with an operating loss of $31 million a year earlier, as the division’s sales jumped 22% to $3.62 billion. Sales of LG’s liquid-crystal display and plasma televisions increased 55% and 10% from a year earlier, respectively.
LG, whose worldwide market share of 12% trails only Samsung and Sony, according to DisplaySearch, has benefited as customers from emerging markets replace cathode-ray tube TVs with LCDs while U.S. consumers prepare for the switchover to all-digital broadcasts next February by upgrading their sets. The TV-making unit helped the parent company boost sales by 21% to $11.3 billion, LG said today.
Annual global TV shipments among all brands will rise 4% to 208 million units this year with revenue rising 5% to $109 billion as LCDs take over cathode-ray tube sets as the world’s most popular type of television, DisplaySearch said last month. Samsung reports earnings later this week while Sony reports earnings next week.