OLED-Info newsletter

New OLED TVs unveiled at CES 2017

LG Electronics, Sony and Panasonic unveiled new OLED TVs at CES 2017 in early January 2017. Starting with LG, the company launched new models of its existing four OLED TV series, the OLEDB7, OLEDC7, OLEDE7 and OLEDG7 signature TV. At the top of the line, LG launched its OLEDW7 Wallpaper Signature OLED TV with a thin (2.57 mm) panel that attaches magnetically to the wall. The W7 comes in either 65" or 77". All of these new TVs feature updated HDR support (for four different standards), WebOS 3.5 and Dolby Atmos sound. Interestingly, the C7 is no longer curved - so LG actually will have no curved OLED TV to offer in 2017.

Sony presented its first OLED TV (well, except the 2008 11" XEL-1). The XBR-A1E Bravia OLED TV features a flat 4K OLED panel, and the TV isbased on the Android TV platform and features HDR (both HDR10 and Dolby Vision HDR) and a built-in speaker which is part of the stand behind the TV to create a stand-less form factor. Sony will offer the TVs at 55", 65" or 77" and the TVs will ship later in 2017. The OLED panel themselves are produced by LG Display. According to reports, LGD agreed to supply Sony with 100,000 panels each year.

And finally we have Panasonic with its EZ1000, a flat 65" 4K HDR OLED TV that offers the company's "most faithful picture ever". The TV, which uses an LGD WRGB OLED panel, offers up to 800 nits of brightness for a "true" HDR experience. The TV features Panasonic's new processing chip, the Studio Color HCX2 to enable its Hybrid Log Gamma and Absolute Black Filter technologies. The EZ1000 will start shipping in Europe on June 2017.

OLED microdisplays news

CES also brought us some interesting new OLED microdisplays products and devices.

San Francisco based Osterhout Design Group (ODG) officially announced two new AR headsets, both based on OLED microdisplays. The high-end R-9 provides a 50-degrees FOV based on a FHD (1080p) OLED microdisplay. This device is based on ODG's own Project Horizon platform, and will ship in Q2 2017 for around $1,799. The R-8 offers a smaller FOV (40-degrees) and a lower resolution OLED (720p). The R-8 will ship in the second half of 2017 for "less than $1,000". It is highly likely that these OLED microdisplays are supplied by Sony - which is the only company that ships 720p microdisplays.

OLED microdisplay maker eMagin announced that the company started to ship 2k x 2k OLED microdisplays "as part of an agreement with a Tier-One company". This could be the announced first licensee for eMagin's HMD design or this could be a different company. eMagin also announced today that it signed a second partner (or customer?) and expects to sign more such agreements in 2017. eMagin also demonstrated its high-brightness direct patterned OLED microdisplays for the VR and AR market to select customers at CES. The display demonstrated in June 2016 (called the OLED-ULT) featured a high luminance of 4,500 nits and a PPI of 2,645.

Kopin unveiled its first OLED microdisplay called the Lightning, which features a 2048 x 2048 resolution (2k x 2k) at 1" diagonal and a fast refresh rate of 120 Hz. Kopin specifically targets VR applications for this new microdisplay. Kopin did not reveal when this new display is expected to ship. Kopin is now entering the OLED market, and is operating as a fabless producer - outsourcing both the backplane production and the frontplane OLED deposition.

Also in January, the EU launched a project call LOMID (Large cost-effective OLED microdisplays and their applications) that aims to develop next-generation large-area OLED microdisplays for VR and AR applications. The project's partners will produce flexible OLED microdisplays sized 13 x 21 mm (about 1-inch diagonal) with a resolution of 1200x1920 (2,300 PPI). More information can be found here.

Towards the end of January we posted a premium article that details the OLED microdisplay market with its different makers. For an updated review of this market, with all different displays on the market and future plans, check out our OLED microdisplay market report.

Display makers order ALD/PECVD encapsulation systems

Thin-film encapsulation for flexible OLED panels require both organic and in-organic material deposition. Kateeva claims that its ink-jet systems are the industry standard for organic encapsulation deposition, but the in-organic part can be deposited in several different ways. In early January Meyer Burger announced that it shipped an inkjet+PECVD system to an Asian customer. The CONx TFE OLED thin film encapsulation system includes the two deposition technologies to offer a complete encapsulation solution for flexible OLEDS.

A few weeks later, ALD equipment maker Encapsulix announced that a leading Asian AMOLED manufacturer has chosen its ALD-TFE deposition systems, to be used as flexible AMOLED encapsulation. The first tool is already under construction and will start operating in the spring of 2017. Encapsulix says that the order was awarded following an extensive evaluation of available ALD platforms. In September 2016 it was reported that both Samsung and LG are aiming to switch from PECVD to ALD for their in-organic encapsulation process.

Are JDI's flexible LCDs ready to compete with OLEDs?

Japan Display announced that it is developing flexible LCD displays. The company demonstrated a 5.5" FHD LCD that it brands as FULL ACTIVE FLEX, aiming to mass produced such displays that compete with flexible OLEDs in 2018. The 5.5" flexible Full-HD LCD's normal refresh rate is 60Hz, but it can be driven at 15Hz which significantly reduces the power consumption. The brightness of the display is 500 cd/m² and the contrast ratio is 1500:1.

JDI published a video (click here to watch it) that shows the display in action. The video shows how flexible the display is - but it also shows that the LED backlighting unit is not flexible which seems to be a major flaw - I'm guessing JDI will want to change that, otherwise there's not much point in a flexible LCD...

OLED impressions from China, 2017

We spent a couple of weeks in early January visiting China - mostly around Shanghai. We attended the Printed & Flexible Electronics China 2017 conference, visited both EverDisplay and Visionox to learn more about their OLED products and plans, and also went to Wuxi to see the interesting and quite impressive graphene center over there.

Samsung Display and LG Display are the clear leaders in AMOLED production - for almost 10 years now. But the market is now changing as several new players, mostly in China, are starting to commercially produce AMOLED displays - mostly for mobile phones, wearables and VR headsets.

We were quite impressed with those new AMOLED displays at EDO and Visionox - and hopefully this increased competition will help make the OLED market more accessible. We already list several of these China-made AMOLEDs at the OLED Marketplace, and hopefully new ones will soon follow.

BOE on track for 2017 6-Gen Chengdu fab

According to reports, BOE Display's first 6-Gen OLED fab in Chengdu, which BOE started constructing in May 2015, is on track to begin production in the 2nd half of 2017 - later than first estimates, but earlier than the revised ones). Production capacity will be 45,000 glass substrates.

BOE will invest a total of $3 billion USD in this new fab, but part of that is funded by Chengdu's High-Tech Industrial Development Zone. The new fab follow BOE's current 4.5-Gen pilot line that is already producing AMOLED displays. In October 2016 BOE also announce a third OLED fab, in Mianyang. This will be another 6-Gen AMOLED fab, but it will produce flexible OLEDs on plastic substrates. According to BOE's plans, this fab will produce 45,000 sheets per month and will enter production in 2019. Total investment in this fab is estimated at 46.5 billion yuan ($6.87 billion USD).

In May 2016 BOE Display demonstrated several new AMOLED prototypes - including a 4.35" bendable and foldable OLED displays. The bendable panels offer a resolution of 1120x480 (HWVGA, 280 PPI) and a bending radius of 15 mm. The brightness is 350 nits. The color gamut is 100% NTSC. The foldable panels are the same - except the bending radius is much smaller at 5 mm.

The European GLADIATOR project developed a functional 2x1 cm flexible OLED lighting panel based on graphene electrodes.

LG suggests using the flexible nature of its large-area OLED panels to turn them into high-end speakers

According to reports, Dell canceled its high-end 30-inch 4K OLED monitor, the Ultrasharp 30 OLED. Dell announced the monitor at CES 2016 (one year ago, exactly) and promised it will ship by the end of March 2016 for $4,999.

Despite the huge Galaxy Note 7 recall, Samsung Electronics announced an excellent quarterly report for Q4 2016, boosted by strong OLED sales, a weak Korean Won and good chip sales.

Novaled (owned by Samsung) has started constructing its new €20 million fab and office buildings, to be located in the north of Dresden

According to a report from Japan, Sharp will build an OLED production line at Foxconn's factory in Zhengzhou. The investment in this new fab will total around 100 billion yen and production will begin in 2019.

Reports from Japan suggest that KM and Pioneer are finalizing an agreement to spin-off a 50:50 OLED lighting JV

Dell's Alienware's 2017 smallest gaming laptop features a 13-inch 2560x1440 400-nit touch OLED display on the highest-end model

A 14-inch high-end laptop that comes with either an LCD or OLED display (2560x1440 in both cases)

The Vapor is a sport-oriented smartpwatch that features a round 1.39-inch 326PPI AMOLED display

A dual-screen smarphone that features a 5.5-inch FHD AMOLED on the front and a 5.2-inch 960x540 E Ink screen on the back

Samsung's fashionable Galaxy range A3 has a 4.7-inch 720p Super AMOLED display

Samsung's fashionable Galaxy range A5 has a 5.2-inch FHD Super AMOLED display

Samsung's fashionable Galaxy range A7 has a 5.5-inch FHD Super AMOLED display

The P2 is a high-end Android smartphone, featuring a 5.5-inch FHD (401 PPI) Super AMOLED display

The Pro 6 Plus, an Android smartphone, has a confusing name, and also sports a large 5.7-inch 1440x2560 (515 PPI) Super AMOLED display

The J1 is a low-end budget smartphone bound for India, with a 4.7-inch WVGA Super AMOLED display

A Chinese-market Android smartphone with a 5.7-inch Full-HD Super AMOLED display

The world's first Tango-enabled and Google Daydream ready smartphone features a 5.7-inch 1440x2560 Super AMOLED display

Vertu's latest luxury smartphone sports a 5.5-inch 2560x1440 AMOLED display

A high-end medium-format mirror-less camera that sports a 1280x960 OLED EVF