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Apple signs deal with LG for display supply

LG received $500 million upfront as part of a five-year deal that seems similar to deals Apple has cut with flash memory suppliers.

Tom Krazit Former Staff writer, CNET News
Tom Krazit writes about the ever-expanding world of Google, as the most prominent company on the Internet defends its search juggernaut while expanding into nearly anything it thinks possible. He has previously written about Apple, the traditional PC industry, and chip companies. E-mail Tom.
Tom Krazit
LG has cut a deal with Apple to supply displays for products like the MacBook Air. Apple

Apple has signed a five-year deal with LG Electronics to secure a supply of LCD displays.

Reuters reports that LG has received $500 million as a down payment on the deal, which LG disclosed in a filing to the Korea Exchange. The two companies are not exactly strangers; one analyst in South Korea estimated that LG already provides around 70 percent of Apple's flat-panel displays.

The deal appears to be somewhat similar to long-term supply deals that Apple has cut with flash-memory companies like Samsung, Micron, and Toshiba. Apple agreed to pay $1.25 billion in 2005 to five flash-memory companies in order to make sure it had enough chips at the right prices as its iPod division grew.