Manufacturers including Sony Corp. (NYSE: SNE), Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics, Panasonic Corp. (NYSE: PC) and Sharp shipped more than 232 million TVs in 2012. But that is 6% fewer than the 249 million units shipped in 2011. For the first time ever, LCD TV shipments, which take 87.3% of unit market share, declined.

None of this is good news for the TV makers. According to research from NPD DisplaySearch, North American shipments were flat in 2012, shipments to Japan and Western Europe fell by 6% and shipments to China rose 6%. China was the world’s largest market, taking 52 million — or nearly a quarter — of global shipments. Sales in emerging markets were also down, with only Eastern Europe, up 17%, showing strong growth and that due to a switchover from analog to digital broadcasting.

Samsung took 27.7% of global revenues for flat panel TVs in 2012, up from 24.8% in 2011. Revenue share was down at Panasonic, Sony and Sharp by 26%, 34% and 22%, respectively. Overall, flat panel TV revenues were down 5% year over year.

Are people not buying TVs because they are buying other devices like tablets and smartphones? That may be true in the developed market, but clearly Chinese consumers are buying TVs in big numbers. Or could it be that TVs do not change much from year to year? 3D TV never caught on, super HD TV is still too costly for the mass market and consumers in developed countries already have flat panel TVs.

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