LG Rollable Phone Report Says It Doesn't Use LG Display

This week we caught our first glimpse of what LG described as the world's first rollable smartphone. This device was first shown at CES 2021, the consumer electronics show, the first "all digital" version of the show thanks to the pandemic through which we're still living. Today it's been reported that this LG-made smartphone with rollable display won't have a display made by LG.

LG makes displays – and LG is pretty good at making displays. They've been making displays for all sorts of devices for decades. The futuristic display technology central to the success of this first of it's kind smartphone seemed like it'd be a win for LG Mobile and LG Display alike. A report from Nikkei Asia today seems to dash that expectation.

An industry source familiar with the matter spoke with Nikkei, suggesting that the LG smartphone will be employing China's BOE Technology Group to produce rollable displays for their new phone.

At the same time, it's not unheard of that a company as large and multifaceted as LG would work with whatever company they need to work with in order to produce a product. Samsung doesn't always use Exynos SoC as developed by Samsung Electronics' System LSI division and manufactured by Samsung Electronics' Foundry division. They also use Qualcomm chips.

Apple uses a wide variety of manufacturing partners in order to create the iPhone, the iPad, and other devices. LG's mobile division doesnt necessarily have first dibs on LG Display's manufacturing capacity across the board.

It'll be interesting to watch how this all pans out. If LG's rollable smartphone comes to fruition and becomes a hit, will LG move forward with LG Display-made rollable panels, or continue to tap BOE? We shall see!