- German court asks TCL to stop advertising and selling QLED TVs
- Complaints by rival firms allege misleading advertising
- Standardized certification can help buyers
TCL has been ordered to stop selling some of its TVs in Germany. A court in Munich has ruled that TCL had violated the country’s unfair competition law by advertising allegedly QLED TVs that “do not deliver the color reproduction expected from QLED TVs,” as reported by the Korea Times.
The court’s decision means that TCL can no longer advertise or sell current certain QLED TV models in Germany.
The case was filed by Samsung, which claimed that TCL ran misleading advertising, and several lawsuits on the same subject are coming in other countries, including the United States.
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The lawsuits all make the same claim: that what TCL calls a QLED is not a QLED as commonly understood, and that consumers are being mis-sold TVs as a result.
Tests for quantum dots did not find many
The court found that TCL’s quantum dot TVs, such as the QLED870 series available in Germany, did not deliver the properties of a quantum dot LED and that consumers were misled as a result.
This isn’t the first time it’s been claimed that TCL’s quantum dots aren’t delivering the goods. In late 2024, South Korean news website ET News published details of tests that failed to detect the chemicals required to make quantum dots on TCL quantum dot televisions.
The tests were commissioned by the Seoul chemical company Hansol Chemical (which, it is worth noting, works with Samsung, a key TCL rival, and which heavily promoted the results of these tests alongside the launch of the trial) and carried out by Geneva’s SGS and the UK’s Intertek.
According to ET News (via Google Translate), “indium (In) or cadmium (Cd) were not found in three TCL QD TV models. Indium and cadmium are essential materials that cannot be omitted for QD implementation… if neither is present, QD technology cannot be said to have been applied.” You can see the test results here.
TCL contested the results – “The QD content may vary depending on the supplier, but it definitely contains cadmium,” it replied – and published its own tests, including one from SGS, the same company that carried out tests for Hansol.
The results contradicted Hansol Chemical’s tests, but those tests used a different methodology: where TCL’s tests focused on TCL’s quantum dot films, Hansol’s commissioned tests were on finished TCL TVs.
It seems highly unlikely that TCL would get away with selling quantum dot TVs that contained no quantum dots, and the performance of TCL’s QLED screens in our reviews has been consistent with the stated specs and color performance, regardless of what technology was used inside to get there, within the usual margins of error we expect when moving from marketing claims to real-world use.
Hansol Chemical has filed a complaint against TCL with the US Federal Trade Commission alleging false advertising, and TCL is also facing class action lawsuits in several US states making the same claim. TCL is not alone here: Hisense has also been targeted in the US.
The claims and counterclaims indicate a problem with TV technology: Without independent certification, we have to take manufacturers’ claims on faith. And at least in Germany, the court decided that TCL made promises it had not kept.
While independent certification might help consumers, it’s all very confusing now: Germany’s TÜV Rheinland has awarded official certification to both Samsung and TCL for quantum dot TVs, but for different things: Samsung has been certified as “Real Quantum Dot Display” while TCL has been awarded “Realistic Visual Experience.”
TCL declined to comment for this article, and we reached out to Samsung but have yet to hear back. We will keep you posted with further answers.
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