Mumbai | Where, if not in Bollywood, is the perfect place to launch a new cinema solution? At Infocomm India, Samsung introduced the next generation of its cinema LED Onyx platform, Onyx 2.0. With this upgrade, Samsung aims to persuade the cinema market to switch from traditional projectors to LED technology. To date, only 120 theaters worldwide have adopted Samsung’s cinema LED.
Samsung is keeping details under wraps for now, but lifted curtains on some parts of its cinema roadmap at Infocomm India. Alongside an advanced DCI-certified LED for cinema, Samsung plans to introduce an integrated sound system in the future. This sound system will be provided in partnership with JBL, a Samsung subsidiary.
The world’s first certified LED cinema opened in Seoul in July 2017. Samsung, and later LG, had hoped for high demand, given the more than 200,000 cinemas in operation worldwide. But the big breakthrough is yet to come.
The cinema business is extremely cyclical and dependent on successful Hollywood productions. In addition, the cinema industry has only switched from analogue to digital projectors recently, often with substantial public funding. With limited financial resources for further upgrades, the industry struggles to invest in new technologies. Additionally, LED walls are much heavier than traditional screens, often necessitating structural reinforcements to accommodate them.
But perhaps the time is now ripe for a next-gen turnkey Samsung Onyx solution integrating LED and sound. The official market launch will follow shortly.
