LG Gets Serious About Direct View LED With Big Lineup Expansion, Indoor And Out

June 17, 2020 by Dave Haynes

LG’s US Business Solutions unit is getting very serious about LED – both indoor and outdoor.

The Korean display giant was kind of late to the direct view LED party – with Samsung, NEC and Philips all showing LED product for the last few years – but this week it announced more than three dozen indoor and outdoor LED signage models aimed at use-cases like retail, hospitality, attractions and conference facilities.

“LED Signage is the most impactful and cost-effective way for businesses and entities of all kinds to compellingly deliver messaging and content,” says Dan Smith, LG Business Solutions USA’s vice president of business development, in a press release. “Just as LCD and plasma televisions changed the game in their day by providing a larger, brighter, better-looking canvas to display messaging and marketing content, LED Signage is transforming how commercial venues think about their digital messaging and design today.”

Says the PR:

The 46 models, which span LG’s 10 different LED Signage categories, will all be available in 2020, with 19 models shipping now.

Featuring pixel pitches of 0.9mm to 16mm, these LG LED Signage models deliver high brightness capabilities, excellent off-axis viewing quality, lower power and physical infrastructure requirements and 100,000 hour lifespans.

These characteristics make LG’s LED Signage displays the optimal solutions for rooms with a lot of natural light, rooms where off-axis viewing is critical, projects that require 24/7 visibility and reliability and for clients that want to reduce energy usage.

The company has focused heavily, in recent years, on OLED – which is entirely different display tech than LED. The product is gorgeous and amazing, but also premium-priced and somewhat niche in terms of applications.

Direct view LED offers a much broader opportunity, albeit in a crowded field. I saw some LG LED at some 2019 trade shows, but the company was not at ISE. Their displays have been used at some great-looking installs, like the Moscow airport and in Las Vegas at what appears to be the new Caesars conference center (don’t think that’s been announced).