Taiwan makers' shipments of LCD monitors increased 3.2% on quarter to 22.32 million in the third quarter of 2014, which also represented a 7.4% on-year decline.The on-year decline is the steepest drop for Taiwan makers over the last five years, produced mainly from increased demand for tablets.During the third quarter, 58% of products shipped were sized 20-inch and above as vendors pushed to release larger sizes. Higher-end products such as Ultra HD were also a focal point for vendors.In terms of performance, TPV and Qisda maintained the healthiest shipments compared with other makers.Looking to the fourth quarter of the year, the makers can expect to see shipments rise 3.1% on quarter but drop 6% on year. The amount will bring total shipments to 87.08 million in 2014, down 4.6% on year to bring the makers' global proportion up 0.2pp to 63.6%, said Digitimes Research.Digitimes Research added it expects that global LCD monitor shipments will decline another 2-3% in 2015.

Shipments of tablet-use application processors (AP) in China are forecast to rise 4.7% sequentially in the fourth quarter of 2014, according to Digitimes Research. Meanwhile, shipments from Intel are set to outpace those from Allwinner Technology during the quarter enabling the US firm to break into the top-three providers.Intel is expected to ship 5.1 million tablet APs to the China market in the fourth quarter, up 104% from the 2.5 million units shipped in the third quarter, said Digitimes Research. The rapid shipment rise will boost its share of the market to 14.6% from 7.5% in the previous quarter.On the contrary, Allwinner's shipments in China are forecast to decline 16.7% sequentially during the fourth quarter dragging down its market share to 12.9%, Digitimes Research indicated.Overall shipments of tablet APs in China will reach 34.7 million units in the fourth quarter of 2014, up 4.7% on quarter and 5.1% on year, with MediaTek serving as the largest provider, Digitimes Research noted.

There will be 74.5 million tablets shipped globally in the fourth quarter of 2014, increasing on quarter by 17.6% but decreasing on year by 10.1%, and of which 20 million units will be iPads, 27.8 million units of non-iPad models launched by major vendors and 26.7 million units of white-box models, according to Digitimes Research.Apple will account for 26.8% of the shipments, followed by Samsung Electronics with 14.6%, Lenovo 4.7%, Asustek Computer 4%, Amazon 3.9%, Acer 1.7% and Hewlett-Packard 1.3%, Digitimes Research indicated.Taiwan-based ODMs/OEMs will ship 30.64 million tablets in the quarter, growing on quarter by 32.5% but slipping on year by 13.8%. Foxconn Electronics will be the largest manufacturer accounting for 48.4% of shipments, Pegatron for 24.1%, Compal Electronics 14.6% and Quanta Computer 11.1%.

China's smartphone application processor (AP) shipments are expected to grow 33.8% on year and 9.5% sequentially in the fourth quarter. The on-year growth will be 8.7pp more than that recorded in the third quarter. But on a quarterly basis, the sequential growth for the fourth quarter will be 2.2pp less than that seen in the previous quarter. The transition to LTE networks is expected to accelerate in the quarter, while 3G chips' shipment share will also decline more rapidly. Most smartphone vendors are expected to shift their flagship products to support LTE networks in the fourth quarter of 2014 as MediaTek's and Qualcomm's LTE chips will become more mature. However, since the two chipmakers will devote more of their efforts to producing LTE products, their 3G solutions are expected to see from shortages, allowing Spreadtrum to fill in the space and snatch their market shares from the 3G segment, according to Digitimes Research's latest report on China smartphone APs.Qualcomm's 64-bit solutions are expected to become its key products for the fourth quarter. The MSM8916 will be Qualcomm's mainstream LTE solution, while its MSM8936/9839 are also expected to attract some orders. Qualcomm is expected to enjoy a sequential shipment growth of 13% in the fourth quarter (down 9.7pp from that of the third quarter) and a 90% on-year growth. The company's 32-bit LTE solutions' shipments will turn weak and gradually phase out from the market, but this will not affect the company's shipment performance. MediaTek's fourth-quarter shipments will see slower growth, which will reduce the company's market share. The company has shifted capacity support to the LTE product line, and its 3G chips' shipment proportion will drop faster than its competitors' and the company's shipments for its baseband plus AP combination will also have an obvious decline. Digitimes Research expects MediaTek to see a sequential shipment growth of 6.7% in the fourth quarter, down 4.4pp from that of the previous quarter. It will enjoy an on-year shipment growth of 30.6%. The company's market share in the quarter will drop to 50.8%, the lowest since the third quarter of 2013.

Smartphone shipments in the China market declined 3.1% sequentially in the third quarter of 2014 as vendors found it hard to stimulate demand for their devices due to a lack of product differentiation, and the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus were not made available till mid-October, according to Digitimes Research.Local vendor Xiaomi Technology and Korea's Samsung Electronics were tied for the number one title in the vendor rankings in the third quarter with each having a shipment volume of over 13 million units to the local China market. It should be noted that the shipment totals are only for smartphones purchased in the local China market and do not include shipments from China vendors such as Xiaomi that are exported to overseas markets.China Mobile saw the number of its new 4G subscribers increase 11.4 million in September alone, pushing the accumulated number of its 4G service subscribers to 40.9 million at the end of the third quarter. This will make it easy for the telecom operator to reach its goal of securing over 50 million 4G subscribers in 2014.With the availability of more 4G models in the fourth quarter of 2014, smartphone sales in the local China market are expected to top 105 million units in the quarter, increasing 16.2% sequentially. However, the ratio of China's fourth-quarter smartphone sales to total global smartphone shipments is expected to edge down to 29.1% in the quarter, Digitimes Research estimates.

Japan is the world's leading country in terms of LED lighting penetration and its LED lighting demand in 2015 will reach JPY507.8 billion (US$4.43 billion), increasing by 13.2% on year and accounting for 78.6% of the total shipment value for all lighting products, according to Digitimes Research.LED lighting will take up 71.6% of total shipment value for lighting products in Japan in 2014, much higher than the corresponding global average of 22.4%, Digitimes Research indicated. The Japan government and LED lighting industry aim to increase the proportion to 100% by 2020.In the Japan market, retail prices for 40W- and 60W-equivalent LED light bulbs currently stand stably at JPY1,633-1,701 and JPY2,447-2,807 respectively, and at JPY9,000-10,300 for LED lamps.Due to relatively high LED lighting penetration, LED lighting vendors in the Japan market are expected to promote sales through enhancing quality and added value instead of lowering prices. Connection of LED lighting with HEMS (home energy management system) is a way of increasing added value. There were about 500,000 homes introducing HEMS as of the end of 2013 and the goal is to increase the number to five million.

Global notebook shipments by top-five brand vendors and top-three ODMs declined 15% on average in October, affected by the roll-outs of new low-priced models in the previous month, according to Digitimes Research.However, shipments by top brand vendors and ODMs alike continued to grow for a few months in a row prior to October as compared to a year earlier periods, indicating an acceleration of concentration of the notebook industry.Among major brands, Lenovo, Asustek Computer and Dell posted a sequential shipment decline rate lower than the industry's average, but Hewlett Packard (HP) had a high fluctuation.Quanta Computer performed better than other ODMs in terms of shipments, as rivals Compal Electronics and Inventec both suffered a sequential decline rate of over 20%.With regard to HP's plan to split into HP and HP Enterprise, Digitimes Research believes that the separation will not affect the business of the two units significantly in 2015 as the operations of related businesses of the two units have been steady, with revenue and profit still moving upward and no major reshuffles in management. However, given that the notebook industry has matured, it remains difficult for the new HP,which is responsible PC and printer products, to continue to stay in a growth track.

Thread, a new networking protocol for household appliances initiated by Google's Nest Labs, looks to compete with the ZHA (ZigBee Home Automation) standard, but there is a possibility for the two technologies to integrate together as they share some basic standards, according to Digitimes Research.Meanwhile, the shift from Bluetooth 4.0 to Bluetooth 4.1 as announced by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) in December 2013 was also aiming at the growing IoT (Internet of Things) market. But the chance is low for Bluetooth, Thread and ZHA to be blended together due basic technology differences.Since members the new Thread Group include Samsung Electronics, ARM Holdings, Freescale Semiconductor and Silicon Labs, this indicates that the cooperation between Samsung and Google will go beyond Android devices and Chrome PCs to digital household appliances and IoT devices, Digitimes Research commented.The Thread Group is open to business members earlier than scheduled and plans to officially launch Thread 1.0 in 2015 as well as to begin offering verification of Thread-compatible devices.

Taiwan makers' shipments of touch panels used in handsets reached 50.44 million in the third quarter of 2014, down 5.7% on quarter, according to Digitimes Research.The makers suffered from decreaed orders from Apple for the iPhone 4/4S while China-based vendors were still clearing out inventories. Additionally, Wintek's shipments were limited due to financial issues.Looking ahead to the fourth quarter of the year, relevant shipments are expected to increase 6% on quarter to 53.46 million as China vendors ramp up production coupled with local telecom providers holding promotions to increase sales. Taiwan makers can expext to see most growth from on-cell and silver nanowire products.Digitimes Research also noted that the makers' tablet touch panel shipments grew 21.4% on quarter to 12.78 million driven largely due to orders for the Nexus 9 in addition to orders from Amazon during the third quarter. Shipments in the fourth quarter are expected to grow 9.3% sequentially to 13.97 million.In terms of touch panels used in notebooks, the makers' shipments grew 27.5% on quarter in the third quarter but are expected to drop 8.7% in the fourth quarter.

Quanta Computer will ship 49.1 million notebooks in 2015, increasing on year by 7.8% and the only one among the five largest Taiwan-based notebook ODMs that will see sequential growth in 2015 shipments, according to Digitimes Research.Compal Electronics will see 2015 notebook shipments drop 6.6% on year, Wistron 2%, Inventec 9.6% and Pegatron 5.9%, Digitimes Research indicated.Taiwan-based ODMs will ship a combined 134.514 million notebooks in 2015, slipping 4.2% on year, and the corresponding global market share of 80% will fall 2pp on year.Apple currently has Quanta and Foxconn Electronics undertaking OEM production MacBook-series products but Quanta will become the only OEM in 2015.LCFC (Hefei) Electronics Technology, a joint venture established by Lenovo and Compal in northern China, is expected to increase notebook shipments to 20 million units in 2015. As such, Lenovo's in-house notebook production will rise to 21.8 million units in 2015, taking up 59.6% of its total shipments in the year.