Verbatim started shipping the Velve OLED lighting evaluation kit back in May 2011, and last month they sent us a unit for review. This is the world's first (and only) color-tunable OLED lighting panel. Being able to change the white light temperature (or even display colors) is very nice and I'm sure designers will love to use such a panel to create ambient and mood lighting installations. The kit itself encloses the OLED panel in a large and heavy rigid case, which is a bit of a shame.

Verbatim tells us that the kit is almost sold out (they have probably stopped manufacturing them, getting ready to release the 2nd generation panels and kits soon). You can still find some on line though, and the kit costs $802.75 (a single module costs $752.05). Read our full hands-on review here.

The Korean government is funding a new program ("Future Flagship Program") that will develop transparent and flexible OLED technologies with an aim to produce ultra high-definition 60" flexible OLED displays by 2017. The project will be led by LG Display, and will also include equipment-maker Avaco.

The Korean Ministry of Knowledge Economy is spearheading the program, and they say that this technology may have a large impact on the Korean economy, creating 840,000 jobs and $56 billion in yearly exports.

There's a report from Korea suggesting that Samsung managed to reach 350 ppi on an OLED display using FMM (Fine Metal Mask). Up until now Samsung focused on LITI to reach such high resolutions, but it seems that the company is now moving away fro LITI. The results were achieved in the lab, but may be quickly applied to Samsung's current AMOLED fabs.

We have no confirmation of this report yet, but if true it may be very exciting as the relatively low resolution of OLED panels (compared to high-end LCDs) is one of the biggest disadvantages of the technology.

Raymond Soneira, our friend and display guru from DisplayMate have posted a very interesting and detailed comparison of the OLED displays in the Galaxy S, SII and SIII phones. He says that while all three OLED panels performed very well, there has been a rapid and significant improvement in OLED performance (especially power efficiency) in just 2 years.

Raymond laments the fact that all of those OLEDs suffer from a lack of accurate color calibration. Still he sees a very exciting future for OLEDs - as it is expected that improvement will continue at a very fast pace.

Lumiotec announced new "natural white" OLED lighting panels that feature the world's highest color rendering index (Ra93*1, a CRI of over 90). This is very close to natural light, and Lumiotec targets high-end retailers and museums. The panels feature an efficiency of 28 lm/W, and Lumiotec told us that they use a hybrid design, comprising of both fluorescent and phosphorescent materials (provided by UDC).

Lumiotec hopes to sell around 15,000 panels in 2012, from all types. The company is confident that they can reach their target based on the sales they achieved in 2011. Lumiotec's production capacity is about 50,000 yearly panels.

Universal Display announced that it is buying Fujifilm's entire worldwide OLED patent portfolio - over 1,200 OLED patents and patent applications for $105 million. UDC will not only strengthen its existing OLED patent portfolio, but will also "explore new and exciting areas of OLED materials and product development for the future". Fujifilm will supply their highly functional materials (barrier films, conductive films, flexible substrates and more) to OLED makers. In the future the two companies intend to strengthen and enhance this alliance.

Fujifilm has been involved with OLED R&D for over 10 years, and have developed "promising new technologies in OLED materials as well as devices using such materials". We don't have a lot of information about those patents. I did find about 24 patents online, detailing Platinum based phosphorescent OLEDs, blue phosphorescent materials and a lot of device structures.

There are some interesting reports that the Brazilian Development Bank (BNDES) decided to reduce its backing for Foxconn's plans to establishing LCD fabs in Brazil. It seems that the Brazilian Government is not happy with Foxconn's decision to produce LCD panels and not OLEDs - as they were hoping that the company will produce next-gen technology based panels in Brazil. Foxconn's investment in the new fab was supposed to be $4 billion (that's only the first phase, the total cost would have been around $12 billion). The BNDES was supposed to fund 30% of the project. BNDES and Foxconn are still in negotiation, trying to reach a new agreement.

Philips is going to reduce its large OLED lighting panel prices - all large OLEDs (whether dot, rectangle or tall) will cost only €86. This is quite a drop - the large rectangular for example currently costs €269. If you buy two large OLED panels, you'll get the electronics for free.

Philips is also going to release a new starter kit for its new GL350 functional lighting panel. The kit will include three GL350 panels, one short circuit protection (SCP3001), one Xitanium driver and all the required connector cables. The price will be €400. Read more about Philips' OLED lighting panels price reduction here.

There's a new company called Stimulated Blue Technology, established a couple of months ago in Henan, China, that aims to produce small OLED panels based on its patented blue-coating technology. The details are rather sketchy, but it seems that the technology (developed by Xinyang Normal University) involves some sort of blue-coating or filter layer and only red and green OLED emitters.

The company is setting up a 4.5-Gen (730x920 mm) fab in Henan that will produce Metal-Oxide TFT based OLEDs. The capacity will be 360,000 substrates a year. The same fab will include two OLED lines and one LED-LCD line. The total investment for the OLED lines is 2.2 billion yuan (about $345 million).

The 14th annual OLEDs World Summit, presented by Smithers Apex in conjunction with the OLED Association, will focus equally on display and lighting technologies this year, providing the most comprehensive look ever at the entire spectrum of OLEDs. The event will take place on September 26-28 in San Francisco, California.

OLED-Info readers receive a $200 discount off of the conference price by using code OLEDINFO when registering online at oledsworldsummit.com.