A new display product for wearable smart devices independently developed by TCL. [Photo/WeChat account of Optics Valley of China]

TCL China Star Optoelectronics Technology Co, located in the East Lake High-tech Development Zone (also known as Optics Valley of China, or OVC), occupies about a 20-percent share of the global display panel supply chain, with its LTPS AMOLED display panel product ranking first and its flexible AMOLED screens for phones ranking fourth in the world in total output.

Zhang Feng, who joined the company in 2010 as a core technician of the research team, took part in the construction of the TCL's first display production line in Shenzhen, which took just 17 months.

TCL's business then expanded from Shenzhen to Wuhan. "The Shenzhen-based workshop mainly dealt with large TV display panels, which are standardized products, while the Wuhan-based workshop mainly produces small-scale display panels that are highly customized and demand fast research and mass production," Zhang recalled.

In less than half a year since TCL's t3 projects began operating, its t4 projects were established in OVC. The only firm in the world then that could achieve mass production of flexible displays was Samsung. But in 2019, TCL owned Hubei's first semiconductor display panel factory worth more than 10 billion yuan ($1.47 billion).

TCL's 8-inch 360-degree foldable screens debuted at the International Conference on Display Technology this year held in Fuzhou.

Last year, TCL ranked 32nd in terms of international patent applications among the world's top 50 companies. It was followed by Tencent and ByteDance. It has been the champion of Hubei in invention patent applications for the past seven years.