The OLED-Info newsletter, September 2016
Published: Tue, 10/04/16
New OLED TVs demonstrated at IFA 2016
One of the world's largest consumer electronics trade shows, IFA, took place in September 2016. During the event, several companies demonstrated new OLED TVs. All of those TVs use OLED panels produced by LG display.
So first up we have Philips, with its first OLED TV, the 901F. This is a 55-inch 4K OLED TV that supports three-sided Ambilight, HDR and Philips' Perfect-Pixel Ultra-HD picture processing. Grundig also revealed its first TV, the 65VLO9790 - this one uses a larger 65" 4K panel and is made by Turkish Arcelik. Grundig's TV will launch in the autumn of 2016 for around €3300 in Turkey.
Arcelik also demonstrated its own OLED TV, which also uses a 65" 4K panel. Arcelik will offer this to other OEMs. Fellow-Turkish electronic makers Vestel had a 65" 4K OLED TV of its own on display.In other OLED TV news from IFA, Panasonic unveiled a new "reference" OLED TV prototype, Loewe demonstrated its upcoming Bild 7 OLED TV, and China's Skyworth unveiled a dual-view 55" OLED display for commercial and signage applications.
Apple's Watch Series 2 and iPhone 7
The new Watch Series 2 is Apple's 2nd-Generation smartwatch that has several improvements over the first generation - including a built-in GPS, waterproofing and better hardware. We're mostly interested in the display, of course, and the Watch 2 display features the same size and resolution as the first generation - either 272x340 38mm or 312x390 42mm. The main improvement in the new display is that it is twice as bright at 1,000 nits (the original Watch's display had 450 nits).
For the first time ever, Apple finally admits that this is an OLED display. This is great, and hopefully it means that Apple is ready to admit that OLED displays are better than LCDs. It is likely that the new display is again a flexible AMOLED made by LG Display.
Apple also announced the new iPhone 7 and 7 plus, with many upgrades. The display are still LCDs - the iPhone 7 has a 4.7" 1334x750 (326 PPI) IPS LCD and the 7 Plus has a 5.5" FHD (401 PPI) display. DisplayMate says that the iPhone 7 display is truly impressive - and is the top performing mobile LCD display ever tested.
OLED TFE market news
One of the major challenges towards flexible OLED panels was traditionally the encapsulation. Companies had to come up with a way to quickly and cheaply deposit thin-film encapsulation (TFE). Ink-jet developer Kateeva started to offer organic material encapsulation systems in 2014 and the company now says that it has taken a "commanding lead" in the OLED TEF market. Kateeva further says that it secured the "vast majority" of available TFE orders, and its customers include the world's largest flat-panel display makers in three key Asia regions - which probably includes Korea and China - and the third region is either Taiwan or Japan.
Kateeva recently raised $88 million from China-based investors (BOE Display, TCL Capital and others) - which brings the total funds raised by Kateeva to over $200 million. The company is now gearing up to provide OLED TV ink-jet production systems to display makers. A couple of months ago we posted an interesting interview with Kateeva's Chief Product Officer Eli Vronsky - with an overview of the company’s product strategy and an updates on the technology and business.
While ink-jet printing seems to be the procedure of choice for the organic material deposition in TFE, full TFE stack also contains in-organic materials. Currently both LG and Samsung producers are using PECVD to deposit the in-organic materials, but according to a report from ETNEws, both Korean display makers are thinking about switching to ALD. Several companies, including Jusung Engineering, WONIK IPS, AP Systems and TES has ALD-based encapsulation deposition systems ready to be used in display production. Both LG and Samsung have finished with R&D work on ALD technology and are ready to introduce commercial systems into their production lines.
Is EDO planning a $4 billion 6-Gen AMOLED fab?
According to Digitimes, China-based AMOLED producer Everdisplay is planning to invest $4.1 billion USD to build a 6-Gen AMOLED factory. The upcoming factory will have a monthly capacity of 30,000 substrates and will start trial production in 2018.
Mass production in the new fab is expected by early 2019 - and will include panels from 1 to 13 inches. It is not mentioned in the report whether these are regular glass-based AMOLEDs or flexible ones.
Everdisplay started mass producing 5" 720p AMOLED displays towards the end of 2014 in a 4.5-Gen line with a monthly capacity of 20,000 substrates. Since then the company added more displays - wearable panels and larger 5.5" ones. Everdisplay is also developing flexible panels, transparent panels and high-density AMOLEDs for VR applications.
LG OLED updates
LG Electronics is strengthening its OLED TV marketing as the company sees OLED TVs becoming a "central megatrend" in 2016. The company announced a new cooperation with Best Buy in the US and expects more than 10 TV makers to sell OLED TVs in 2016.
LG lowered the price of its 55" OLEDC6 curved 4K OLED TVs, which are now available for $2175 (down from $2,497). LG's 2015 65" EG9600 TVs are also offered at the new low price of $2,499. Over at the high-end, the company finally launched its 77" Signature OLEDG6 TV in the US - for $19,999.
LG is also producing flexible small-sized OLEDs, of course. Apple launched its Watch Series 2, with a new brighter flexible AMOLED - which is likely made by LG Display. According to reports, LG intended to use an edge-type flexible OLED on its upcoming G6 flagship phone, but LGD cannot yet produce enough flexible OLEDs for such a device and those plans were scrapped.
Volkswagen's new concept has OLED lighting
Volkswagen unveiled a new all-electric concept car - the I.D. The car uses Volkswagen's dedicated battery-electric vehicle architecture, called Modular Electric Drive (MEB). The I.D. uses thin OLED taillights.
The reports say that the headlights combine LED and OLED, and indeed from the image above it seems that the headlights are surrounded by thin OLED strips...
OLED-Info's market reports updated to September 2016
A few weeks ago we published new versions of our market reports - that cover the transparent, automotive, microdisplay, VR/AR and flexible OLED markets. OLED-Info provides comprehensive niche OLED market reports, and our reports cover everything you need to know about the niche market, and can be useful if you want to understand how the OLED industry works and what this technology can provide for your own industry. The reports are now updated to September 2016.
Our updated report list:
Meet the OLED-Info team at P&FE China 2017
On January 11-13 2017 Shanghai will be hosting the annual Printed and Flexible Electronics China conference. The OLED-Info team will visit this event - so if anyone wishes to schedule a meeting - now is a great time to do so. The event organizers were kind enough to offer a 20% discount for OLED-Info readers (to both visitors and exhibitors) - contact us (or simply reply to this mail) for more information on how to get this discount.
The event focuses on several topics (or tracks), and these include OLEDs, Quantum Dots, sensors, graphene, VR and AR, wearables, wireless power and energy. Approved keynote speakers include professionals from Universal Display, the OLED Association, Visionox, First O-Lite, TCL and more.
Visionect's JOAN Meeting Room Assitant is a smart calendar scheduling solution based on a 6-inch E Ink display. OLED-Info readers get free shipping!
Merck began to construct the new Darmstadt OLED plant in June 2015. The new fab provides a fivefold increase in the company's OLED materials production capacity.
The installation portrayed the "constellation of rays scattered throughout space" to express the "wonderful qualities and extreme white and dark contrasts" of LG's Signature OLED TVs.
TCL revealed that SDC will invest $315 million in TCL's upcoming Gen-11 LCD and AMOLED fabn in Shenzhen. The fab will have a monthly capacity of 90,000 Gen-11 substrates when it starts producing panels in April 2019.
Blue TADF developer Cynoa signed an MOU with Gaungdong Johua Printing Technology, a new entity formed in 2016 by CSoT (66%) and TianMa (34%) with an aim to industrialize printed OLED technology by using an open-innovation platform guided by the Chinese government.
Solvay decided to exit the OLED market as it sees further delays in soluble OLED introduction, and the company sold most of its IP to NCI. Solvay's IP is focused on soluble HIL and HTL materials.
UBI sees Apple purchasing 518 million flexible OLED panels in 2021 - surpassing Samsung Electronics with 298 million.
AMOLED revenues will reach $14.3 billion - surpassing a-Si LCD revenues ($14 billion) and almost surpassing LTPS LCD (at $14.7 billion).
The NFL Network's GameDay Studio now makes use of six 55-inch Planar LookThru OLED monitors
Read our premium article to find out how will Apple's upcoming (rumored) OLED adoption as a secondary MacBook Pro display effect the OLED market
Samsung's On8 is an India-bound smartphone with a 5.5-inch FHD AMOLED display
TCL's flagship smartphone features a 5.5-inch FHD AMOELD display
The 580 is a budget smartphone with a 5-inch 1280x720 AMOLED display and a $210 price tag in China
A round Tizen-based smartwatch with a 1.3-inch 360x360 (278 PPI) always-on Super AMOLED display
A stand-alone VR headset with an onboard Unity-based computer and two 3.8-inch 102801020 AMOLED displays
DeePoon's E2 is a VR headset that uses 1920x1080 75Hz AMOLED display (made by SDC).
A highend 42.9 mp digital camera with 4K video capture and an XGA OLED EVF
A 1-inch type 20MP sensor camera with an XGA OLED EVF
A mirrorless camera with an XGA OLED EVF
Royole's foldable 3D VR headset use an OLED microdisplay with a high (>3,000) PPI.
Sony's updated OLED professional monitors add several new features, and come in either 17-inch or 25-inch.
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