China's first 8.5-generation TFT-LCD production line was launched in Bengbu, East China's Anhui province, on June 18, 2019, representing a breakthrough in the production of high-definition LCD screen, Science and Technology Daily reported.

TFT-LCD, or Thin Film Transistor Liquid Crystal Display, is key strategic material of the electronic information display industry. The Gen 8.5 TFT-LCD production line, launched by the Bengbu Glass Industry Design and Research Institute of the China National Building Material Group, will produce high-definition LCD screens of 55 inches, the report said.

According to the Liquid Crystal Branch of the China Optics and Optoelectronics Manufactures Association, the demand for TFT-LCD in the Chinese mainland was about 260 million square meters in 2018, including 233 million square meters' Gen 8.5 TFT-LCD. However, the annual supply of domestically made TFT-LCD is less than 40 million square meters, with all of them Gen 6 or below, which cannot meet the demand in scale and quantity.

The association predicted that China's market demand for Gen 8.5 TFT-LCD or above will exceed 300 million square meters by 2020, accounting for 49.6 percent of the total global demand.

The production and control precision of Gen 8.5 TFT-LCD is comparable to that of the semiconductor industry, representing a higher level of large-scale manufacturing of modern glass industry.

Core technology of the Gen 8.5 TFT-LCD has long been controlled by enterprises in the United States and Japan, said the report.

The institute in Bengbu, with 60 years of expertise in glass, has finally made a breakthrough in the production of Gen 8.5 TFT-LCD, and will provide key raw material guarantee for China's LCD panel industry after it goes into mass production in September, the report said.