- A report claimed that LG was in talks with Hisense executives to explore a possible sale of LG’s TV business
- The original report has been taken offline to be “reviewed by an administrator”
- LG tells TechRadar that “These reports are baseless”
Today has been a roller-coaster ride for fans of the best OLED TVs – a major report from Korean business news company EBN claimed that LG was exploring spin-off and/or selling its TV business to Hisense.
But the original report has now been removed from the EBN website, replaced with just a pop-up message saying the report is down while it is “reviewed by an administrator”.
An LG spokesperson told TechRadar “These reports are baseless.” LG gave a slightly longer statement to Android Authority that is more forceful: “LG Electronics would like to say that this news regarding the potential sale of its TV business is completely baseless and therefore completely speculative and misleading.”
The original report claimed that LG executives traveled to Beijing to meet executives from Hisense, including discussions about the future of LG TVs and a possible sale of the entire LG TV business to Hisense.
Maybe it happened, maybe it didn’t, maybe it was misreported – LG’s denial is firm, but companies often deny certain things, which they then continue to do. However, if the same were to happen, it would follow an increasing trend, which makes it not necessarily that surprising.
From Philips to Sony to Panasonic … maybe LG?
If LG were considering a full sale or partnership with Hisense, it wouldn’t be the first major TV brand to do so: Sony’s partnership with TCL is likely to give Sony’s mid-market and budget models a boost, with Sony providing the brand’s cachet and proprietary technology and TCL bringing its high-volume production efficiency.
Panasonic has a similar deal with Skyworth to make its American TVs, and many Japanese TV brands are also made under license, including Toshiba and Sharp.
Philips TVs have been made under license for years, with TP Vision making them in Europe and Skyworth making them for the US.
The reason for all this is simple: making TV is a tough business with relatively low margins, so you have to sell tons of TV to make money. LG’s OLEDs are doing good business, but its LED TVs have struggled to impress and aren’t nearly as dominant as their OLED sets.
TCL and Hisense are gaining market share across the board thanks to being able to produce really solid mid-range sets that are pretty cheap – so much so that Hisense eclipsed LG’s sales in the premium TV market last year.
This kind of deal could probably boost LG’s entry level and mid-range offerings, but there would likely be a lot of resistance to it online from OLED fans because Hisense doesn’t have much love for that technology. (A similar concern faces Sony fans from the TCL partnership.)
Still, LG says you have nothing to worry about – reports of the demise of their TV business are apparently greatly exaggerated.
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