Microsoft has officially launched their new mobile operating system, Windows Phone 7. They announced 10 phones from HTC, Dell, LG and Samsung. Three of those phones use AMOLED displays: the Samsung Focus (with a 4" Super-AMOLED (leaked back in July as the Cetus), the Samsung Omnia 7 (with the same 4" Super-AMOLED display) and the Dell Venue Pro (leaked back in April as the Lightning).

There were reports that Microsoft expects most WP7 phones to have AMOLED displays, and even designed the UI so it'll suit those displays (with black background to conserve power). It's great to see that even today, with AMOLED supply issues, 3 out of 10 WP7 phones use AMOLED displays.

UDC had a busy month in October. First they announced that they delivered 8 flexible wrist-mounted OLED display to the US army. Those 4.3" QVGA full-color displays are based on UDC's phosphorescent OLED materials and are built on thin flexible metal foil. This project (done together with L-3 and LG Display) was funded by the DoD. UDC also announced significant advances in the performance of its UniversalP2OLED solution-processable, phosphorescent OLED material systems - with new green, red and light-blue materials.

Back in January we reported the UDC and Moser Baer will build an OLED Lighting pilot production line, based around Universal Display's PH-OLED technology (with $8.3 million in funding from the DOE). We now learned that the entire investment will be $20 million, with Moser Baer Technologies investing $11.5 million to purchase production equipment. The pilot line will be built in New York and is scheduled to begin operation in 2011

UDC also announced that they extended the license agreement with Samsung for another 3 months. The companies are still negotiating the final agreement. Samsung is using UDC's materials (red, and soon green) in their AMOLED displays.

The Fraunhofer IPMS Institute unveiled new OLED lighting panels called TABOLA (the full name is TABOLA OLED Light Tablets), set to be released in Q1 2011 (in sample for designers, not commercial volumes yet). These will be available in three sizes (35 x 75mm², 75 x 75mm² and 150 x 75 mm²), and can be made bottom emitting or transparent. The standard color will be white, but they can also make them in other colors. The tablets can also optionally come with a 'grid' - shaped like a Liana (a vine).

The TABOLA will be made at COMEDD, Fraunhofer's Organic Electronics production center in Dresden, Germany (on a Gen-2 production line, structured by screen printing). Check out this nice video showing the TABOLA panels (and also some other OLEDs made in the Fruanhofer).

LG Display plans to start making small OLED displays next year, in 4.5-Gen and 5.5-Gen lines. They already have customers waiting for those panels. LG's has announced a $225 million investment for the 4.5-Gen plant back in April 2010, and this line is expected to go online soon. LG hasn't committed yet to the 5.5-Gen plant.

LG do have plans for mass-producing OLED TVs, but only in 2013. They say that only an 8th-Gen line will make sense for OLED TVs (in order to be price competitive). LG had plans to introduce a 31" OLED TV in March 2011, but this will not be mass-produced (and it'll be very expensive at $9000).