In 2013, FPCB industry enjoyed a high-speed growth with the market size approximating USD12.03 billion, up 16.2% from the level in 2012. The South Korean vendors developed rapidly and were excessively upbeat about the industry’s outlook, aggressively expanding capacity starting from the very beginning of 2012. As a result, most of new capacity was available in Q2 2013. However, the FPCB companies in South Korea without diversified customers were heavily dependent on the key accounts such as Samsung and LG, thus making them less competitive during negotiations. Therefore, these vendors cut the prices steeply in Q4 2013, sending them into price war.
In 2014, price decline continued to deteriorate, which led to a sharp fall in revenue of South Korean vendors. The implications of high-speed capacity expansion are high fixed costs, which would thus result in a plunge in profit margin. It is projected that the revenue of INTERFLEX, a leading South Korean FPCB company, would tumble by 50%, and its operating margin would record a 27% loss in 2014 in contrast to no-profit-no-loss in 2013. Additionally, affected by the order shift of Apple, the company has hardly received any orders from Apple in 2014.
Another pressure for the vendors in South Korea came from the depreciated yen, and the won appreciated against the yen. However, the Japanese products have better performance; coupled with the reduced prices bought on by yen depreciation, they are more competitive.
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Apple shortened the supply chain, giving more of its orders to the vendors in Taiwan, which resulted in a fall in revenue of M-Flex, at an estimated 20% drop in 2014. And as the losses expand, M-Flex’s operating margin is expected to slip from -8.4% in 2013 to -11.8%.
Despite a substantial