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[Euroluce 2015] Enter OLED Lighting Cheaper Than LED

April 17, 2015/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

An area has emerged where OLED lighting can exceed LED’s price competitiveness.

In LG Chem’s booth in Euroluce 2015 (April 14-19, 2015), a British company Mackwell’s OLED lighting applied emergency system was exhibited. Mackwell applied LG Chem’s OLED lighting panel to the emergency system used in cases of fire/blackout instead of existing LED lighting reducing the overall system installation cost. Mackwell is known to be preparing for commercialization.

LG Chem explained that “construction, excluding lighting, accounts for the 30-50% of total cost for interior lighting. LED lighting requires separate space for installation making construction cost a necessity, but as OLED lighting does not need additional construction this can be reduced. Although OLED lighting’s unit price is higher than LED’s, overall interior cost can be reduced if OLED lighting is used resulting in cheaper price”.

Regarding this, one LED expert observed that, “a certain distance is required between the LED lighting source and device, therefore LED installation space is additionally required and increases the cost” and “if the construction cost could be reduced from interior lighting it would be a great advantage”.

As shown, areas where merits of OLED lighting are actively used are emerging rapidly such as interior, medical, and vehicular lighting. If the cost competitiveness can be achieved from active investment by OLED lighting companies, not only the OLED lighting exclusive market could be created but existing lighting market could be replaced.

Mackwell’s Emergency Luminaire

[Euroluce 2015] LG Chem, Business Acceleration through Lighting Solution

April 16, 2015/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

In Euroluce 2015 (April 14-19, 2015) being held in Milan, Italy, LG Chem started enthusiastic European lighting market promotion with their largest booth of the exhibitions they have participated so far.

By showing the solution for OLED lighting and not an exhibition centering on existing panel and luminaire, LG Chem began active customer creation by supplying OLED panel, module and OLED lighting solution.

LG Chem revealed that “the supply is possible to B2C market through solution regarding OLED lighting, and not just to B2B market”, and that they will “strive to obtain more customers through providing various solutions”. Additionally, they emphasized the importance in new application and widening the scope as well as appealing lighting’s merits; “as most of the attendees are attracted toward the main exhibition, ‘Salone del Mobile Milano’ (Milan Furniture Fair), they showed much interest in transparent connection and rail connection that can diversely be applied to furniture and building”.

Examples of LG Chem’s Transparent Connection and Rail Connection Application

Furthermore, LG Chem exhibited LG panel applied products by partner companies such as Acuity, and Mackwell and introduced diverse areas where OLED lighting can be used.

In order to proceed with active OLED lighting investment, LG Chem is unfolding dynamic marketing to draw in customers. From February this year, LG Chem began selling DIY KIT OLED lighting module through Korean open market, and opened their first booth in Japan in Lighting Fair Japan 2015 which was held in March. In June, LG Chem is planning to open an OLED lighting exclusive exhibition in Nonhyeon-dong in Gangnam (Seoul, Korea) and intensify marketing.

LG Chem Booth, Euroluce 2015

White OLED Display Market to Grow Rapidly to 150 Million Units Production in 2020

April 16, 2015/in Market /by OLEDNET

Large size OLED TV production is one of the hot issues within the display market. Although OLED has long been a focus for the next generation display, the market share of OLED display is still low. According to UBI Research, a market research company, despite the continued increase in OLED panel production volume and application scope, the point when it moves toward consumer market from producer market will be another leap for the display industry.

UBI Research’s White OLED Display Annual Report (published April 15, 2015) notes that mass production actualization of large size display using RGB structured OLED panel has not been possible due to the dead space from drooped effect. Therefore, UBI Research analyzed that the additional processes and investment cost in order to improve this increases the production cost resulting in decreased competitiveness.

Currently, OLED panel with WRGB structure is being regarded as the only technology that can achieve large size display. As key production companies revealed in SID 2014, concentrated efforts in WRGB OLED research and production resulted in approx. 80% of target yield. In 2015, supply rate is estimated to be 600 thousand units, a 40% increase from 2014, and 1.6 million units in 2016. Chinese key panel companies, led by AUO and BOE, also possess pilot lines for large area WRGB OLED panel mass production including Gen8. (Source: White OLED Display Annual Report, UBI Research)

Solution process applied technology is being developed in close pursuit of WRGB OLED, but UBI Research surmises that it will take 3~4 years for the active mass production competing with efficiency and merits of WRGB structure.

UBI Research forecast WRGB OLED’s unrivaled path will continue for another 5 years or so with approx. 150 million units of WRGB OLED display production out of over 1,000 million OLED display units in 2020. Large size white OLED display panel for TV market is expected to record approx. 1.6 million units in 2016 and grow to produce US$ 13,759M in revenue in 2020 (figures 1, 2).

If the selection of WRGB OLED can solve the RGB structure’s limit in large area panel mass production, possible active OLED TV production is anticipated. With the publication of UBI Research’s report the timing of this is expected to be a point of much discussion. Additionally, further analysis is needed on whether WRGB OLED is really the only technology for large size display, and if so for how long WRGB OLED’s peerless growth can last.

[Finetech Japan 2015] Mobile Display up to 700 ppi. How about OLED?

April 13, 2015/in Exhibition /by OLEDNET

At Finetech Japan 2015 (April 6-8), vice president of LG Display, Yoon Sooyoung, forecast the display resolution would evolve to 700ppi UHD for differentiation in technology. Japan Display’s CBO Yoshiyuki Tsukizaki also disclosed that a person can perceive up to 700ppi and estimated that mobile display resolution would therefore develop up to 700ppi.

Currently mobile display is being mass produced at QHD (approx. 500ppi), and UHD resolution is known to being actively developed for LCD. It is analyzed that UHD mobile OLED panel development will be a necessity in order to adapt to the trend toward high resolution. OLED is being mass produced in RGB pixel structure where FMM (fine metal mask) is applied. However, as FMM production technology is difficult, QHD AMOLED panel is being mass produced via pentile pixel structure rather than real RBG pixel structure. Therefore, technology for realization of mobile UHD resolution is expected to be a key issue in future.

For the mobile UHD AMOLED panel realization, securing shadow mask technology that allows for UHD resolution is important. In Finetech Japan 2015, V-Technology exhibited FHM (fine hybrid mask) technology that can produce 700ppi or higher resolution. V-Technology further revealed that “resolution of up to 738ppi can be produced using laser patterning technology after the formation of polyimide film on top of Ni mask”.

Additionally, another method is where white OLED + color filter is applied which uses color filter patterning technology. This is a comparatively easier method for producing high resolution, and JDI is aiming for mass production using WRGB structure. Chinese latecomers are also examining application of white OLED + color filter structure for high resolution AMOLED panel production.

The attention of the industry is now focused on how OLED will react and what solution will be generated facing LCD sector that is evolving toward UHD mobile display.

738ppi UHD Resolution FHM, Finetech Japan 2015

By Yu Jin Hong, reporter@olednet.co.kr

[Finetech Japan 2015] The Third Display Revolution, to be Accomplished by OLED?

April 8, 2015/in Display, Focus on /by OLEDNET

Speaking in a keynote session in Finetech Japan 2015 which opened on April 8, LG Display’s Vice President Yoon Sooyoung reported that “the first revolution in TV market was transformation to color from black and white, the second revolution was from CRT to flat panel display such as PDP and LCD, and the third revolution will be accomplished by OLED”.

Yoon also spoke that “until now the market was formed centering on investment by display companies, but in future the market will be created by differentiation and new application” and added “the key focus will be freedom in design and color quality such as rich color scheme” and that “OLED is the most suitable display for this”.

The differentiation mentioned by Yoon is OLED’s advantage in flexible and transparent realization as substrate can be formed using diverse materials compared to other displays. OLED is also superior in color gamut control through achievement of perfect black. Yoon emphasized the OLED is better suited for next generation display compared to LCD equipped with new technology; “LCD also achieved color gamut exceeding OLED through technology such as QD, but this is during full white, and in mid-range grayscale, color control is difficult in BLU driven LCD. However, OLED can perfectly express black using infinite contrast range and perfect color control is possible even in lower grayscale”.

On the basis of these advantages, LG Display is aiming for shipment of 600 thousand units of OLED panel for TV this year, and 1.4 million units in 2016, leading the launch of large area OLED TV market. LG Display is striving to bring the next generation of display market toward OLED by active mass production of plastic OLED panel. Samsung Display is estimated to further vitalize OLED market with their bold A3 mass production, and Chinese companies’ mass production will also do their part in OLED’s leadership formation in next generation display market.

Vice President Yoon Sooyoung, Finetech Japan 2015

By Yu Jin Hong, reporter@olednet.co.kr

A Place for OLED Unification

April 6, 2015/in Focus on, Others /by OLEDNET

A place for OLED unification was held for Korea’s OLED industry which used to be divided. The two sides of Korean OLED industry, Samsung Display and LG Display, both attended the 1^st OLED KOREA Conference, examining what lies ahead for OLED. This marks the beginning of future OLED display industry where worldwide OLED industry and Korean OLED industry are united.

The division within Korean OLED industry started when LG Display began to produce 55 inch OLED panel when Samsung was the only company that manufactured OLED panel. They each accused the other company of copying their technology and reported to the prosecution and thus the division was born. Last week, they both announced the end of legal disputes. However, although the trial for Samsung’s technology leakage has ended, the prosecution for LG’s technology is continuing. As this is a criminal case, the prosecution has to withdraw charges before it concludes.

In order to end the division within the Korean industry that began from Samsung and LG’s disputes, and to bring together worldwide OLED industry, UBI Research held the OLED KOREA Conference (April 2). 16 OLED experts from Korea, Japan, and China, including from Samsung Display and LG Display, forecast the future of OLED industry and discussed how OLED industry could succeed.

After the conference, approximately 40 industry-academic professionals attended VIP party and commented that the success of the conference was due to Samsung’s presence. Chang Hoon Lee who attended both OLED KOREA Conference and VIP party, and spoke with key speakers mentioned that Samsung will continue to be an axis for OLED industry and lead Korean and international OLED industry. The experts who attended the VIP event expressed hope that future OLED KOREA Conference would aid in the process of Korea, which is OLED device production oriented, becoming the mecca for OLED industry.

By Da Rae Kim, reporter@olednet.co.kr

What is the Next Killer OLED Display Application?

April 6, 2015/in Others /by OLEDNET

The interest in automotive display by OLED industry’s key leaders, Samsung Display and LG Display, is growing. During the 1^st OLED KOREA Conference (April 2, 2015), Dr. Ki-Yong Lee, vice president of Samsung Display, predicted that “in 2018, 1.4 display units will be applied per car and form a market of 150 million units” and emphasized that “flexible OLED panel has an advantage of fast response time and being unbreakable and therefore suitable for automotive display”.

LG Display’s team leader, Won-Gyun Youn forecast that “from the rare keynote speeches from automobile manufacturers in this year’s CES, automotive display could be a new market for OLED”.

Speaking at the 1^st OLED KOREA Conference, Dr. Choong Hoon Yi, the president of UBI Research, also commented that “OLED’s merit of infinite contrast range will provide high visibility even in monochrome and appropriate for drivers, and flexible OLED can be freely applied to vehicle’s interior” and estimated OLED will be actively used for automotive display in future.

OLED display, as flexible display, can be easily produced and cannot be broken. It also has advantages of infinite contrast range and fast response time and is a focus of automobile industry. Several cars have already been released with OLED display equipped instruments including dashboard and navigation. Recently, Italdesign Giugiaro’s concept car, Gea, equipped with LG Display’s plastic OLED was revealed in Geneva International Motor Show 2015.

Following this trend, the company that is most proactive in OLED application in automobile industry is LG Display. LG Display has already announced their target of 30% world market share acquisition in automotive display with the revenue of approx. US$ 1,800 million in 2018. In CES 2015 held in January, LG Display also presented 13.1 inch automotive display and 21.5 inch curved plastic OLED that included instrument panel and CID.

Various Display Equipped Concept Car, Geneva International Motor Show 2015

By Da Rae Kim, reporter@olednet.co.kr

Samsung Elec. and Apple Lead Flexible (Plastic) OLED Industry

April 1, 2015/in Market /by OLEDNET

2015 is forecast to be the year flexible (plastic) OLED actively enters the market. Galaxy S6, which was hugely popular in MWC 2015, is already to have received pre-order for 20 million units. Of these, approximately 50% is estimated to be for Galaxy S6 Edge.

Compared to only several million units of previously released Galaxy Round and Note Edge, the 2015 shipment for Galaxy S6 Edge is anticipated to reach 20 – 30 million units. In order to prepare for Galaxy S6 Edge sales Samsung Display began A3 line operation. Existing A2 line’s Gen 5.5 15K supply and Gen 6’s 15K of flexible OLED panels are to be used. Using these shipment, Samsung Electronics is planning to sell 50% of flexible OLED equipped Edge. What began with Omnia, Samsung Elec.’s lead in rigid AMOLED market is being transferred to their ability to control the secondary flow of flexible OLED market.

Smart phone market’s absolute leader Apple begins the sales of Apple Watch, equipped with LG Display’s plastic OLED, from April. Expected sales volume for this year is approximately 20 million units.

Samsung Elec.’s Galaxy S6 Edge is estimated to cost approximately 1,000 USD, and Apple is releasing various products costing from hundreds USD to thousands USD. If each product from the 2 companies cost 1,000 USD, the total set market is expected to exceed 35 thousand million USD.

The market that these 2 companies will create in this year’s smart device market is quite stunning. Accordingly, the flexible (plastic) OLED panel market is also expected to grow rapidly. Although neither company revealed the panel cost, considering the existing market is staying at 7 thousand million USD the 2015 AMOLED total market is forecast to reach 9 thousand million USD.

An Advanced Peek into OLED Korea

March 30, 2015/in Focus on, Others /by OLEDNET

UBI Research, a market research organization specializing in OLED, is organizing Korea’s first OLED international business conference in the Korea Science and Technology Center in Gangnam on April 2. Despite the fact that Korea is leading OLED industry, an international business conference has never been held until now. OLED panel has been produced and sold but there has been no international OLED industry network centering on Korea.

In order to add software for the continued growth and development of hardware focused Korean OLED panel industry, UBI Research is gathering OLED experts from all over the world in one place.

Being held for the first time this year, OLED Korea’s core key word is “Future of OLED”. Dr. Ki-Yong Lee, the vice president of Samsung Display will give a keynote speech and analyze OLED’s past and present, which has been led by Samsung, and forecast its future. LG Display also has presentation ready regarding OLED TV’s future. As the only display company leading OLED TV business, there will be a talk on their position, and detailed introduction on what is to come. Visionox and Tianma are also introducing their OLED panel and technology that are being developed. Future OLED panel production technology trends can be understood from these 4 companies. Additionally, Japanese Analysis Atelier Corporation’s Dr. Hattori will introduce Japan’s OLED display and lighting OLED industry direction.

Dr. Choong Hoon Yi, president of UBI Research that is organizing OLED Korea, is expected to give a presentation on society that will transform along with OLED under the title of “The Future of OLED”. Based on his experience of planning and developing OLED project, a pioneer in Samsung SDI, and responsible for the beginning of current Samsung’s OLED business as well as 15 years of OLED market research and consultation, Yi will be speaking about how OLED will transform our society. Dr. Yi built OLED section within Korea Display Industry Association, led OLED standardization and cooperation between different businesses, and first developed hybrid encapsulation technology which is being used by LG Display for OLED TV mass production. With this OLED technological background, technology research, and expert knowledge on market forecast, Yi will present a course for OLED industry.

OLED Korea also has presentation by Korean and international equipment and material experts. Dr. Myungwoon Choi, a research director of YAS, who pioneered production of LG Display’s M2 line Gen 8 evaporator will reveal the core technology for the first time. Doosan’s Dr. Tae Hyung Kim who has been mobilizing OLED emitting material business for the past 10 years will give a presentation on OLED emitting material technology and trends. Within material sector, Dr. Chung-Seok Kang, vice president of KCRP (Kolon Industries) will speak on substrate material which is vital for future OLED market leading flexible OLED production. Furthermore, Dr. Tae-Won Kim, principal researcher in Korea Institute of Industrial Technology, will introduce purification technology. Dr. Kim independently developed technology that can efficiently produce OLED emitting material. Shinya Higashio of Japan’s Oswell, a company specializing in moisture proof technology, will discuss cutting edge equipment and technology that can measure moisture penetration.

ETRI, which first developed OLED luminous technology in Korea and moving the technology, will give a presentation regarding OLED lighting technology based on their experience. Dr. Jeongno Lee, who is developing OLED panel in Samsung SDI and leading Korean Display National Project, will introduce OLED R&D support situation and how much the current Korean government is interested in OLED industry. Dr. Lee is also a world class standardization expert who held a president position for International Organization for OLED Standardization.

Seoul National University’s Prof. Changhee Lee is expected to speak regarding QD technology which is estimated to be biggest rival technology of future OLED. Prof. Lee is the leading academic expert in OLED sector, and initiated OLED emitting material business in LG Chem, and Korea’s first expert in while OLED technology. Prof. Lee is also a world leading expert in OLED standardization. He established OLED branch within IEC, an international standards and conformity assessment body, and was its first chairperson. He also spent much effort so that Korea could become a leader in OLED technology industry.

OLED industry’s foremost expert in investment, Jung Hoon Chang, a senior analysis of Samsung Securities, is expected to talk about OLED industry’s competitiveness and market forecast. As Korea’s leading expert in various companies’ performance research and analysis in OLED industry, Jang will suggest investment direction for future OLED related industry.

[Analyst Column] Encapsulation Technology, Where is it Going?

March 30, 2015/in Analyst column /by OLEDNET

Yi Choong Hoon Yi, Chief Analysis / UBI Research

OLED market is heating up again. Rigid OLED market growth was temporarily stalled but with Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics’ new flexible (plastic) OLED products, Galaxy S6 Edge and G Flex 2 respectively, the smart phone market’s temperature is rising. In order to maintain the storm that iPhone brought, Apple is preparing to release smart watch equipped with LG Display’s plastic OLED. Additionally, LG Elec. is targeting the premium TV market with their 55 inch and 65 inch UHD OLED TV.

OLED panel leading company Samsung Display decided on Gen 6 line’s additional investment for flexible OLED production expansion. LG Display also decided on supplemental extension of Gen 4 line in Paju responding to the shortage of plastic OLED supply. Furthermore, JDI is joining in and expected to begin Gen 6 flexible OLED line establishment soon.

Recently announced Samsung Display’s decision to invest in large OLED line is the most encouraging news. Frontline leader in OLED display, Samsung Display mass produced 55 inch OLED panel using RGB OLED and LTPS TFT technology. However, halting the production, Samsung Display explored for technology with better business value and recently selected to produce large OLED panel using WRGB OLED technology.

OLED panel production technology can be largely separated into 3 parts: TFT, OLED, and encapsulation. Large OLED panel production technology is very difficult to obtain yield compared to small panel. Therefore, while the above 3 technologies are important in producing good panel, technology that can acquire good yield for mass production can guarantee business value. Particularly, as encapsulation is the last process, the final yield depends on the encapsulation method.

In that case, what encapsulation technology is most suitable for large area OLED panel production? As OLEDNET article published on January 12 mentions, from the technology trend perspective the answer is hybrid encapsulation technology. This technology is completed with device’s passivation film, moisture proof top plate that can cover the top, and organic material that adhere the top and passivation film. From the design trend perspective, the technology must be able to bend. Recently, the TV market is moving toward curved design, and to respond to rollable display as well the top plate has to be metal rather than glass. (Reference, 2015 OLED Encapsulation Report, UBI Research)

Hybrid encapsulation technology can be further divided into film method and dam & fill method depending on the adhesive structure between top plate and passivation film. Film method is being applied to mass production by LG Display, and dam & fill method was developed led by Sony. This method dispenses adhesive polymer liquid after organic dam installation on the panel border. This can only be used when the top plate is glass. LG Display completes the process by sealing the metal plate laminated with adhesive film to the device. A best suited technology for curved TV and rollable TV production.

The OLED panel for TV production technology decided by Samsung Display was initially known to select WRGB OLED structure similar to LG Display, but TFT and encapsulation technology have not yet been revealed. However, TFT technology is highly likely to be oxide TFT. (Reference February 27 OLEDNET article) LTPS TFT has high investment cost compared to oxide TFT and has low business value at similar performance.

What is left is encapsulation technology. For this technology also a method already commercialized by LG Display, film lamination method, is most suitable since metal plate is favorable for curved design. Metal plates is strong against external shocks and favorable for heat sink. Glass has lower heat conductivity compared to metal and requires additional protection against heat; this means that production cost can only increase. Considering design, protection against external shocks, and reduced heat sink cost, LG Display’s hybrid encapsulation technology that uses metal plate is the most ideal. Therefore, the direction that Samsung Display should also head toward is metal plate and film using method.

Although small OLED for mobile technology developed by Samsung Display became the norm, it is estimated that LG Display’s technology will become standard for large OLED panel production.

Chinese Companies’ Aggressive Chase, BOE’s Active Secondary Investment for OLED

March 26, 2015/in Market /by OLEDNET

It was revealed that public tendering began regarding BOE’s 5.5G AM-OLED project on ICB Operator, a Chinese international tendering network site.

BOE possesses Gen 5.5 AMOLED line in Ordos, and is preparing mass production using SNU’s evaporator. It is analyzed that the additional investment regarding Gen 5.5 AMOLED project has been confirmed as SNU evaporator yield has mostly settled. It is estimated that BOE’s mass production of AMOLED panel for mobile will be able to begin earnestly in the second half of the year.

BOE, OLED Project Public Tender List

<Source: ICB Operator>

Chinese panel companies aiming for mass production of AMOLED panel for mobile in 2015 are Visionox, Truly, Tianma, and EverDisplay as well as BOE. Of these, EverDisplay is known to be already supplying panel’s sample base.

The focus is now on how the active mass production of Chinese OLED panel companies will affect the OLED industry which is currently being led by Korea’s Samsung Display and LG Display.

Chinese Companies Begin Active OLED Panel Production Line Operation

March 23, 2015/in Market /by OLEDNET

The Chinese companies are estimated to begin active production of OLED panels, a market for which used to be dominated by Korean companies. Following this, the market for emitting materials for OLED panels also started shifting.

“OLED Emitting Material Annual Report”, published by UBI Research in March 2015, forecast that Chinese companies will begin mass production of AMOLED panel for mobile in second half of 2015, and large area panel from 2017. Together with China’s mass production of panel, emitting material market is estimated to grow into US$ 560 million in 2015, a 16% increase from 2014, and approximately US$ 2,500 million in 2020.

Emitting material companies that rely heavily on Samsung and LG’s panel mass production are anticipating supply chain advancement to China, and considering business expansion in China in order to increase revenue. Idemitsu Kosan is the most proactive and has already started supplying materials to BOE and Tianma. Duksan Neolux began supplying to BOE’s Ordos factory and deliberating on furthering business in China. (Source: Trend Analysis of Key Material Companies, 2015 OLED Emitting Material Annual Report)

With the expansion of panel market, increased competitiveness by Korean emitting material companies is required to acquire supply chain. This is also when Korean panel production companies need to obtain technology in order to retain their market share against Chinese companies.

Emitting Material Market Share by country: UBI Research

[FPD China 2015] Tianma, Reveals China’s First FHD OLED Panel’

March 19, 2015/in Exhibition /by OLEDNET

A display company Tianma succeeded in developing China’s first OLED panel with FHD resolution. There are several companies that mass produces or is developing AMOLED panel for smart phones. Samsung Display and LG Display are in Korea, JDI in Japan, and AUO in Taiwan. In China, the companies include Tianma, Visionox, Truly, and EveryDisplay, as well as BOE. The 4 companies that are mass producing the AMOLED panel are Samsung Display, LG Display, AUO, and EverDisplay. Of these, only Samsung and LG are pass producing FHD AMOLED panel.

With LCD panel for mobile, products with resolution of FHD or higher are already being mass produced. However, due to the manufacturing process, it is difficult to produce OLED panel with FHD resolution or higher. As emitting materials are evaporated via fine metal mask (FMM), obtaining high resolution of high precision FMM is a priority. In order to manufacture high precision FMM, metal plate of 40um or less is needed, and also requires technology that allows for highly accurate process. Only 2 companies, Japan’s DNP and Toppan, can produce high precision FMM, and since they have exclusive contracts with Samsung and LG respectively, they cannot provide FMM. Therefore, JDI employs WOLED structure that does not require FMM for AMOLED development and commercialization.

To develop high resolution AMOLED panel, Tianma has been independently developing dual FMM. Although it has not been confirmed what type of FMM was used for the FHD AMOLED revealed in FPD China 2015, they exhibited 5.5inch FHD OLED product with 400ppi resolution.

Resolution of FHD or higher can be realized by manufacturing OLED panel itself purely by process, or by another method with pentile technology. Currently it is difficult to produce FHD with the first method and even Samsung and LG are utilizing the pentile technology. As such, it is likely that Tianma’s AMOLED is pentile driven. Pixel structure needs to be analyzed once the product is available on the market.

FHD AMOLED panel from Tianma, FPD China 2015

‘The 1st OLED KOREA Conference ‘ by UBI Research

March 18, 2015/in Others /by OLEDNET

The international Business Conference highlighting the present and future outlook of Organic Lighting-Emitting Diode(OLED) is held.

“UBI Research(the president, Choong hoon Yi)” specialized in OLED industry, has announced that “The 1st OLED KOREA Conference” will take a place 2nd of April, 2015 at The Korea Science and Technology Centre(SC Convention) located in Yeoksam-Dong, Gangnam- Gu.

This event’s main agenda is to review the current issue and to figure out the best practice to response it as OLED is becoming more widely used especially in TV, Automotive vehicle, Lighting, Smart phone etc.

Choong hoon Yi, the president of UBI Research will provide a perspective of the future of Flexible OLED as well as the factors why OLED TV will lead the market even though the technology for LCD is still continuously improving.

The attendees and the president, Choong hoon Yi will together have an open discussion about the current situation and future where the businesses in OLED industry are struggling.

Ki-Yong Lee, the Vice president of Samsung Display will present “the past, present and future of AMOLED Display” on this conference.

Xiuqi Huang, the CEO of Visionox R&D Centre and KSFPD will explain the whole process from researching and developing OLED Display to its production.

Also Won Gyun Youn, the team manager of OLED TV Product Planning, LG Display plans a speech about “the commercial possibilities of OLED TV”, and Chung-Seock Kang, the Vide president of KCRP will focus on “the development status of plastic substrate for Flexible Display”.

In addition, the overview of OLED display and lighting industry in Japan(Analysis Atelier Corporation, Dr. Hisashi Hattori), ▲ Gas Transmission-rate measuring system[OMEGATRANS](O-WELL Corporation, Shinya Higashio), ▲the present and prospect of AMOLED(Shanghai Tianma AMOLED Co., Ltd. , Special Assistant to General Manager Alan Huang), ▲Technologies for Efficiency Enhancement in OLED(ETRI, Dr. Jeong-Ik Lee), ▲Hybrid purification technology for OLED(KITECH, Principal Researcher Dr. Tae-Won Kim), ▲Key Technology of 8G In-line Deposition System for OLED TV(YAS, Director Dr. Myung Woon Choi), ▲the competitiveness and market forecast of OLED industry(Samsung Securities, Senior Analyst Jung Hoon Chang), ▲the current status and key issues of Quantum dot LD display technology(Seoul National University, Prof. Changhee Lee), ▲OLED Material development trend and the achievement(Doosan corp, Team Leader Dr. Ta Hyung Kim), ▲nationwide support for OLED R&D and its strategy of the key countries(KIT, Dr. Jeongno Lee) will be covered throughout the conference.

After the conference, there will be “VIP Dinner Gala” hosted by UBI Research where the experts, executives and researchers from a number of business in OLED industry, institutes and academia, shall have a warm place for networking and communication.

UBI Research is planning to hold the international business conference every year and the 1st OLED KOREA Conference will be a start. The registration can be made on the company

OLED Emitting Material Market, To Grow into US$ 560 Million in 2015

March 16, 2015/in Focus on, Material /by OLEDNET

According to ‘’OLED Emitting Material Annual Report’’ published by UBI Research on 13 March, OLED emitting material market of 2015 is forecast to grow into US$ 560 million, a 16% growth compared to 2014. The report analyzed that active operation of LG Display’s E4 (M2) line, and operation of Samsung Display’s A3 line, and an increase in operation rate by existing A1 and A2 lines are the main cause for the market growth. Additionally, due to the intense mass production start by the latecomers and expansion of large area OLED panel market, the OLED emitting material market is estimated to grow by 35% compound annual growth rate, and form approx. US$ 2,500 million market in 2020.

In terms of countries, Korea occupies the most of 2015 OLED emitting material market with its market share of 90% or higher. However, from 2017, with China’s bold mass production, China is expected to hold market share of over 20% or higher. Thus, emitting material companies are projected to target Chinese market.

AMOLED panel applied to Samsung Elec.’s Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge, which were revealed in MWC2015, utilized new supply chain and it is estimated these will be used for AMOLED panels of future products. Dow Chem.’s phosphorescent red host materials were chosen for the new supply chain.

Regarding this matter, the head of UBI Research Dr. Choong Hoon Yi will give an in-depth presentation titled ‘The Future of OLED’ discussing OLED emitting material market and OLED industry at the 1st OLED Korea Conference. The 1st OLED Korea Conference will be held in SC Convention in Gangnam, Seoul, South Korea on April 2.

LG Chem, DIY KIT Released for Average Consumers to Experience OLED Lighting

March 11, 2015/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

In February 2015 LG Chem released OLED DIY Kit in Korea so that average consumers can directly experience the high quality of OLED light, closest to the natural light.

OLED is a light-emitting diode formed with organic semiconductors that emit light with its characteristic color. OLED is currently being used for TV and lighting, and receiving attention as the next generation diode. Particularly, spectrum distribution of OLED lighting is closest to the sunlight and produces a sense of stability of being under the natural light. Additionally, with its high color rendering index, colors can be accurately reproduced. Unlike the existing light sources, OLED is not hot to touch, and does not hurt eyes when looked directly. With no UV rays, it is a human-friendly light. It also produces almost no blue light compared to other sources and as such it is effective in eyesight protection. It is thin, light, flexible, and has potential for infinite designs.

In order for the average consumers to experience the OLED lighting with these advantages, LG Chem prepared the OLED DIY Kit with simplest possible components and connection method. Single Kit contains one LG Chem’s 100x100mm OLED module, Double Kit contains two modules for wider choice, and DIY Kit includes an OLED panel (a bulb equivalent), switch, and wiring set linked to connectors. It has an accessible and simple structure so that the light comes on just by linking the connectors two or three times, and connecting a micro 5-pin adaptor (compatible with normal Android mobile phone charger). The panel thickness of LG Chem’s 100x100mm module is only 0.88mm so that even with the neat aluminum case the thickness is 2.2mm. If the module and switch are attached by using wood, paper, or wire, or by reforming existing products, lighting of desired shape is complete.

To showcase environmentally friendly nature of OLED lighting, LG Chem minimized using extravagant packaging material and exuberant colors, and produced a simple cardboard box. It is an ultra-energy conserving light of high energy efficiency with less than 2.5W required for Single Kit, and less than 5W for Double Kit.

Of the OLED lighting industry, LG Chem is producing the world’s best performing OLED lighting panels with largest size and best lifetime surpassing other companies such as Philips and Osram. Due to their own key material production and advanced process technology, LG Chem also has an edge in price. In order to accommodate consumers’ requests, a testing team made up with staff of LG affiliated companies was formed and generated various DIY production ideas. The final DIY Kit was produced with improvements suggested by the testing team.

In Korea, OLED DIY KIT is currently being sold on internet shopping sites such as G Market and 11St. LG Chem is planning to release the product in Japan and China from April, and rest of the world, including Europe and USA, from May.

[Lighting Fair Japan 2015] LG Chem, 100lm/W OLED Lighting Panel Mass Production Possible in April 2015

March 10, 2015/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

LG Chem estimates mass production of highly efficient 100lm/W OLED lighting panel in April this year. In Lighting Fair Japan 2015 (March 3 – 6) LG Chem announced that they have achieved 2014 target of 100lm/W development, and that mass production will be possible from April 2015. Additionally, they presented the 140ml/W roadmap until 2017, and LG Chem is forecast to keep on leading the OLED lighting market.

Until now OLED lighting had lower efficiency compared to the existing fluorescent light (approx. 100lm/W) and LED (approx. 100lm/W or higher), and was mostly used as luminaire rather than down light. However, if active mass production of 100lm/W products begins, utilization as down light will also be possible.

In this exhibition, LG Chem showcased solution concept of down light, and not a luminaire focused exhibition. They also demonstrated OLED lighting’s competitiveness as down light by securing lifetime of 40 thousand hours. This is approximately twice as long as fluorescent light and rivals LED. The biggest issue for OLED lighting is the cost. If the price becomes competitive through active investment, it is analyzed that the OLED lighting market will grow rapidly.

According to UBI Research’s OLED Lighting Annual Report 2014, OLED lighting market is forecast to grow by 100% of compound annual growth rate and form US$ 4,700 million market in 2020.

By HyunJun Jang, reporter@olednet.co.kr

[Lighting Fair Japan 2015] LG Chem. Begins Intense OLED lighting Marketing in Korea and Japan, Following Europe

March 6, 2015/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

In order to actively open LG Chem’s OLED lighting market, they began intense marketing in Korea and Japan, following Europe. Formerly, OLED lighting marketing took place centering on Europe’s high-end luminaire market. However, LG Chem opened their first booth in Japan in Lighting Fair Japan 2015, and showed how easily OLED lighting can be applied in everyday life by exhibiting solution for down light rather than focusing on luminaire. LG Chem revealed their anticipation for Japan’s OLED lighting market’s growth explaining, “Japan’s conversion rate to area lighting is increasing rapidly and it is estimated the demand for OLED lighting will increase.”

LG Chem also began their marketing in Korea for the public. Average consumers were able to come in contact with OLED lighting easily as OLED lighting DIY Kit and table lamp “FRAME” appeared on the open market. Particularly, OLED lighting DIY Kit provided 100x100mm OLED lighting panel, wire, and switch that can control the light (30/60/100lm), and allowed the public to apply the kit for various uses. Currently OLD lighting DIY Kit is being sold for approx. US$ 86, and OLED table lamp “FRAME” for approx. US$ 254. However, when LG Chem’s active investment and mass production begin, the price is expected to fall further.

LG Chem’s OLED table lamp “FRAME” and OLED DIY KIT Being Sold in Korea’s Open Market

Example of OLED DIY KIT Use, Lighting Fair 2015

By HyunJun Jang, reporter@olednet.co.kr

[MWC2015] Smart Watch Market, Struggle Expected in Google OS Sector

March 5, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

In MWC2015, various companies, including Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics, Huawei, and Asus, exhibited smart watch. Since 2014, Samsung Elec. and LG Elec. began to sell smart watch, Asus and Huawei are shipping smart watch equipped with rigid AMOLED panel. Apple, a latecomer but also strongest rival, is planning to actively sell smart watch, with LG Display’s plastic OLED, from April.

From the outside, all 5 companies have smart watch with AMOLED, but other than Apple which uses iOS, and Samsung Elec. that uses Tizen, the insides of the other 3 companies are the same. This is because they use Google OS. Hence the software of these 3 companies’ products are similar, and without the smart watch exterior the functions are almost identical. The only differentiations are due to smart watch design. Huawei’s smart watch face design is similar to LG Elec.’s, and the back design practically cannot be distinguished from LG Elec.’s products.

In MWC2015, Google sector showed how difficult it would be for any company to conquer the market.

[MWC2015] Trend Analysis of Samsung Electronics Exhibition Strategy

March 4, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

Samsung Electronics, Apple, and Xiaomi can be considered the big 3 brands in smart phone market. Of these 3, only Samsung Elec. opened a booth in MWC2015. Apple and Xiaomi do not participate in offline exhibitions; Apple always holds independent introduction events for new products, and Xiaomi only handles online sales. The reason that Apple holds their own exhibition is due to their use of operating system, iOS, different from other companies’ Android system, and also their unrivaled position as the inventor of smart phone. They also have the ability to create buzz in world market through independent product reveal and promotion. Compared to this, Xiaomi is considered Apple’s imitator but in order to sell low-priced smart phone, having no offline stores is actually beneficial. As smart phone market within China occupies approx. 50% of world market, there is yet no need to promote the products overseas.

However, the situation for Samsung Elec., having to compete against Apple and Xiaomi, is different. They have to compete against Apple in high-priced smart phone market, and compete against Xiaomi’s mid-to-low priced smart phone that uses the same Android OS in Chinese market.

Samsung Elec.’s concerns were evident in MWC2015. Above all, for their flag ship model Galaxy S6, they chose to use exhibition strategy that could aptly present a mystical image of a ‘creation’ rather than a ‘product’.

First, regular visitors were allowed to see, but not touch. Second, by placing each product in pillar-shaped exhibition box in 2 rows with plenty of space in between, the area was reminiscent of a high-end designer store. The visitors were able to examine the 4 sides of Galaxy S6.

This concept of differentiated exhibition space demonstrated Samsung Elec.’s talent for marketing. Their emphasis on Galaxy S6 as a ‘creation’ rather than a ‘product’ showed their concern for maintaining their place within the high-end smart phone market

Samsung, Galaxy S6, MWC2015

Most of the mid-to-low price phones released by Samsung Elec. since last year were presented. Excluding Galaxy Z series, only available in certain countries, all of E series and A series were exhibited. Products that appeared on the market in the second half of 2014, Galaxy Note and Galaxy Tab, were also displayed in the same space.

Most of the companies utilize the exhibition space as a singular area. However, to suit world’s leading brand, Samsung Elec. applied an outstanding use of location by utilizing it as a dual space; existing products were displayed on the surface of the exhibition area, and Galaxy S was displayed in the deep creating the sensation of falling into Samsung.

Galaxy S6 Edge, MWC2015

[MWC2015] Smart Watch Trend, LG Electronics is On It

March 3, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

The rapidly rising product to become the key item for IoT industry is a wearable device, smart watch. Various companies are already producing numerous products for the smart watch market. Beginning with smart band, the majority of smart watches had square face, but since LG Electronics joined this market, the trend started to change into a classic watch design.

In 2014, LG Elec. revealed G Watch in various events and became involved in its sales. Following the existing watch, they employed high-end sports watch design. While many experts estimated smart device with differentiated design from existing watches would become popular, the actual market responded to a round faced watch design, more familiar to the public after more than 100 years of use.

Subsequent to G Watch, LG Elec. revealed LG Watch Urbane in MWC2015. Compared to G Watch, Urbane arrived with higher class appearance.

Chinese set company Huawei introduced a smart watch with round shaped AMOLED in MWC2015, reacting to the success of G Watch. Samsung Elec. is also expected to release circular faced device for the next smart watch.

<Urbane, LG Electronics>

<Huawei watch, Huawei>

[MWC2015] Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy 6 and the ‘ultimate weapon’ Galaxy S6 Edge

March 3, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

Samsung Electronics, currently leading the world’s smart phone market along with Apple, showcased intensively developed Galaxy 6 and the ‘ultimate weapon’ Galaxy S6 Edge.

Following Galaxy S5, S6 used rigid AMOLED panel. However, Galaxy S6 Edge, following Galaxy Note 4 Edge, used flexible AMOLED and chose a new design where both sides of the edge are curved.

At the Samsung Elec.’s unpack event, held a day before the opening of MWC2015, Samsung Elec. CEO JK Shin was confident that everything changed except for the name. Galaxy S6 is Samsung Elec.’s ‘ultimate weapon’ where they concentrated all of their efforts in order to rectify S5’s slump. Galaxy S6’s 64-bit, 14-nanometer AP, 577ppi flexible AMOLED, and wireless charging technologyare such efforts. Its design that includes metal body, 2-sided edge, and graceful curves that link display and body is also a masterpiece that was not seen in any other products.

The main reason that Samsung Elec. could apply artistic design was flexible AMOLED produced by Samsung Display. It allowed the product to express the elegantly curved lines of hanbok, Korean traditional dress, through the main body and arched 4-sided corners. Furthermore, the chemistry of the glistening metal body together with the deep blue, a first for flexible AMOLED, can cut the most appealing figure of the existing smart phones.

<Galaxy S6 Edge, Samsung>

The Reason WRGB OLED TV Can Only Succeed

February 27, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

It has already been 2 years since OLED TV entered the market. LG Electronics and Samsung Electronics opened the market together with the release of 55 inch FHD OLED TV, but currently the market is developing around LG Elec. and some Chinese set companies.

Samsung Elec.’s OLED TV is using RGB OLED structure similar to the OLED panel applied to Galaxy series, and LTPS TFT. On the other hand, LG Elec. is using WRGB OLED, developed by LG Display, and oxide TFT.

However, Samsung Elec. stopped OLED TV production in the second half of 2013, and began to express negative opinions regarding OLED TV industry since CES2014. They determined OLED TV to be underdeveloped and required approximately 3 more years of further work. Also, as 8 mask of LTPS TFT or oxide TFT was used to develop OLED panel for TV, and therefore higher cost compared to LCD, Samsung and many other display experts continued to view it negatively. Various media was filled with unfavorable articles particularly regarding whether LG Display alone could maintain the OLED panel industry which required massive amount of investment.

Despite this, WRGB OLED received legitimate recognition with the start of 2015. First, with the 3 stack tandem OLED structure and HDR technology, they were able to provide sharper picture quality than LCD with the peak intensity of up to 800 nit. Second, 8 mask oxide TFT production processes were reduced to 4 mask production and lowered investment cost, which led to a more reasonable panel price.

The halved number of masks in the TFT production signifies that the number of processes can be reduced and increase the yield rate. It also means the amount of large scale investment essential to the TFT production can be reduced by 50%.

The rival display of LCD mostly uses 4 mask process of a-Si TFT. If the existing Gen8 line, with capacity of 200K, is changed to LTPS TFT or 8 mask oxide TFT process, the capacity is reduced to approx.. 90K and increases the TFT production cost by more than 200%. However, in 4 mask production, the LCD line can be altered to TFT exclusive line for OLED without any loss of capacity; this would place the TFT production cost on the same level as LCD. Of course, as the existing line can be used without additional factory construction will reduce the investment cost even further.

Therefore, if OLED is developed using 4 mask oxide TFT technology, theoretically the production cost falls to the level of LCD panel production price excluding BLU. As the large area OLED panel market is in early stages, the OLED evaporator and encapsulation equipment price is still high, but the equipment price will fall rapidly within 2-3 years and the investment cost is also expected to be reduced.

The display market research organizations are estimating the large OLED panel price to be at least $3,000, but according to the 2015 Annual Report by UBI Research, the LG Display’s 55 inch FHD OLED panel price is only expected to be around $900, and a 55 inch UHD OLED panel is to be around $1,400. UBI Research analyses that there is some difference from the actual sales price as LG Display’s M2 line production and yield rates are low, but if the full capacity of 26K is reached and the yield rises to above 80%, the current supply price can easily be met. Particularly if the large scale mass production system is established with the addition of M3 and M4 lines, it is predicted that OLED panel price will be reduced so that there will only be 1.1 times difference compared to LCD panel.

There are many experts who mistakenly predict that large area OLED panel, which has higher price tag compared to the continued investment cost as it is still in early stages, will fall behind LCD’s cheaper price strategy. However, much like how TFT-LCD overwhelmed the Braun-tube market, OLED TV will also be a household item within a few years.

2015 Annual Report by UBI Research writes that in 2016 when M2 line will be operating normally, approx. 1.7 million units of UHD OLED panel production will be possible, and predicts the investment of M3 line in 2016, with the shipment of approx. 2.7 million units of OLED TV in the market in 2017. This is a much weaker figure compared to the almost 200 million units of LCD panel market for TV, but within the new UHD TV market with 55 inch or higher it is expected to hold a large market share.

<LG Elec. OLED TV, CES2015>

[Analyst Column] AMOLED equipped smartphone promotes enlargement of the display on mobile device

February 23, 2015/in Analyst column /by OLEDNET

According to the “2015 OLED Display Annual Report” published by UBI Research, it was researched that the 5-inch AMOLED display is the main product for a smartphone.

The report shows almost no fluctuation in the number of AMOLED equipped smartphone manufacturers for the last three years from 2012 to 2014 – 13 (2012), 11 (2013) and 14 (2014) – but the major smartphone display size that these companies sold was set in-between 4-inch and 5-inch.

Among 31 AMOLED equipped products, there was only one 5-inch smartphone accounting for 3 percent in 2012, but it has increased to 21 percent with 5 products among 21 in 2013, and 19 products in total of 27 forming 70 percent in 2014.

Samsung Electronics strategized the two elements which are not available in iPhone as points of differentiation to compete with the biggest smartphone rival company Apple. The first plan is targeting the color gamut of LCD. The existing LCD can only reproduce approximately 80% of NTSC which is the broadcasting standard. Although it became possible to enjoy TV and movies through a smartphone with the development of communication technologies, there is a difficulty in reproducing the 500nit of TV quality on a smartphone with the brightness of 200nit. The limit in increasing the brightness of a smartphone is in that the power consumption needs to be minimized to use the smartphone for a long time with the battery. In view of that, Samsung Electronics chose the AMOLED panel as a key strategic part meeting the NTSC standard in low power consumption as an alternative for the LCD panel for the consumers to identify more precise colors. It is expected that the demand for AMOLED panel capable of accurately realizing colors of a product will increase further given the latest growth in shopping clothes with smartphones.

The second plan is in the display size. While iPhone focused on a 3-inch small sized smartphone for a better sense of grip to enhance portability, Samsung Electronics was more focused on “a product of better visibility” rather than “a product of better hand grip”. Obviously the early AMOLED panel has low resolution. Therefore, the bigger display was needed to realize high-resolution as it is hard to fix the opening ratio of shadow mask which is used in manufacturing the pixel for AMOLED panel.

Samsung Electronics succeeded in catching up with Apple, the inventer of smartphone, in terms of the color gamut and size of AMOLED display. Now Apple finally abandoned the matter of grip and expanded the display size to 5-inch.

Although Samsung Electronics was a latecomer compared to Apple in the smartphone market, the choice of AMOLED by Samsung Electronics made the Samsung Electronics of today and also prepared the base for the AMOLED to thrive. In addition, the Samsung Electronics’ strategy enabled the smartphone display in the world to develop into a 5-inch “device to see”.

Choong-hoon Yi, Chief Analyst/ UBI Research

AMOLED Panel Market, to Reach US$ 46 Billion by 2020

February 11, 2015/in Focus on, Market /by OLEDNET

2014 was the year preparing a platform to develop the OLED industry in full scale.

There was a prevalent doubt in the industry until 2014 concerning whether the OLED TV is able to break into the market or not. However, as LG Electronics successfully released the UHD OLED TV, the set manufactures were classified with the companies against LG and incapable of producing the OLED TV. Under this circumstance, the majority of TV set manufacturers including Samsung Electronics exhibited the Quantum dot (QD) BLU LCD TV at CES2015. The night view screen which was the exhibition concept only appeared on the OLED TV was employed on the QD LCD TV chasing the high contrast ratio just like the OLED TV.

In the display for a mobile device, the OLED succeeded in establishing an exclusive market with G Flex2 and Galaxy Note Edge with emphasis on the flexibility feature that LCD cannot even attempt to imitate.

According to the ‘’2015 OLED Display Annual Report’’ published by UBI Research on the 10^th, the total revenue has decreased by 4% compared to the previous year due to the AMOLED panel shipments cut resulting from the low sales of Galaxy S5 in 2014.

Is the OLED industry already in crisis?

Though the OLED industry got wet with rain for a while in 2014, it will begin to solidify its place in 2015. Flexible OLED and TV are the alternatives.

UBI Research methodically analyzed and took a close look at the future of flexible OLED on the ‘’2015 OLED Display Annual Report’’. There are a number of display manufacturers developing products in view of that the rollable display is the final stage of a flexible display. But if the rollable display is to be applied on a mobile device, the cultural components are to go back to the analog age and in terms of technology, it may cause a heating problem as all parts excluding the display are concentrated on the body. For that reason, UBI Research prospected that the rollable product will be used on a large movable screen type display rather than on a mobile device.

Also the ‘’2015 OLED Display Annual Report” of UBI Research forecasts that the AMOLED panel market will grow at a CAGR of 30% reaching US$ 46 billion by 2020. Assuming the OLED panel for TV and tablet PC will take the sales share of 30% respectively in 2020, the report predicted that the key application for the OLED panel market will be a TV and a tablet PC following a smart phone.

The growth of AMOLED panel market is anticipated to accelerated after 2017 given that Chinese manufactures are also likely to invest in full scale between 2016 and 2017 to previse the Korea’s monopoly of AMOLED market.

<AMOLED Panel Market Prospect>

[Analyst Column] The last station of TV is the contrast ratio as seen at CES2015

February 3, 2015/in Analyst column /by OLEDNET

Began from a CRT, also called brown-tube, the TV market went through a LCD TV, a PDP, and a LED and finally reached at an OLED TV. The TV market with the history of almost 80 years now narrowed down to the war between a LCD TV and an OLED TV.

Theoretically speaking, it is genetically difficult for both a LCD TV and an OLED TV to become a better TV than a brown-tube as LCD realizes gray scale by adjusting the level of voltage from the liquid crystal which cannot completely block all light while the organic materials in OLED decompose when exposed to ultraviolet light not to mention the blue light.

Not deterred by these limitations, the LCD pushed out the rival displays of the brown-tube and PDP in the market, obtaining the honorable crown, and now it went on to prepare for the competition with a new display of OLED in full scale.

The picture quality of a display is determined by the three elements of contrast ratio, color gamut and resolution.

The contrast ratio is the most basic information necessary for recognizing an object developed as a human evolves for millions of years. The human eye can distinguish an object only with a black and white shape at night without the moon and it also perceives a three dimensional space as a distant object is the information resulting from the difference between contrast ratios. But the human eye gets tired faster than any other organs. When a human gets tired, he/she closes his/her eyes to sleep and this action is to block the light from outside. For the bright lights like sunbeam blind the human eye that is susceptible to light, it is critical to avoid the exposure to direct lights around the eyes by wearing a hat with a brim in the open air. The sunglass functions in the same purpose.

Thought an office area uses bright florescent lights as a human gets active in a bright place, a house requiring comfort, high-end restaurant, hotel, etc. are recommended to take the brightness creating the appropriate shadows according to the position of the right sources. It is because a human body relaxes and feels comfortable through the eyes in the adequately dark environment. Furthermore, the human eye cannot detect the intensity of very bright light but the degree of darkness can be distinguished easily. Therefore, a TV that is most beneficial to a human body is a product made with the display that fully produces darkness. That is the OLED TV.

LCD always employed the notion of resolution as distinctive marketing strategy when competing with a brown-tube and a PDP in the market. It is due to the fact that the display with the higher resolution provides more information and the picture and video express smooth images. Though LCD had poor contrast ratio and color gamut than a brown-tube and the price also was relatively high, it grew rapidly indebted to the diverse contents like MS Office and the development of internet.

The emergence of OLED which has superior contrast ratio and color gamut than LCD and even the resolution equivalent to LCD became the biggest challenge for the LCD panel manufactures which have already made a huge investment. As LG Display is the only manufacturer capable of producing a large OLED panel with the 4K resolution, it is very urgent for the TV manufactures to secure the highest possible quality LCD TV to compete with the LG Electronics’ OLED TV.

The LCD TV made with the BLU using the quantum dot (QD) material got one step closer to the OLED TV obtaining the 100% of NTSC which was only available for OLED.

The key is the contrast ratio.

Choong-hoon Yi / Chief Analyst / UBI Research / ubiyi@ubiresearch.co.kr

LG Chem. announces new OLED lighting product milestones

January 28, 2015/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

LG Chem announced today that it achieved two important milestones in the development of OLED lighting products with the start of manufacturing of the 320 x 320 mm OLED light panel, the world’s largest available in the market, and the completion of the research and development phase for a new plastic-based OLED light panel.

The 320x320mm OLED light panel is 0.88mm thick panel and has an efficiency of 60lm/W, CRI over 90, and has output levels of 800lm with a nominal input (8.5V 1,600mA). The panel’s output can reach 1,200lm which is similar to a common 60-75 Watt incandescent lamp. This is significant because it marks first time that OLEDs can be considered as an energy-efficient / human-friendly light source available for general purpose use.

With LG Chem having begun mass producing the 320x320mm panels in January, the panels can be ordered at $680USD per panel, with a lower negotiated price for bulk orders.

LG Chem has also completed development of a truly flexible plastic-based OLED light panel and engineering samples are now available. LG Chem’s current bendable OLED panels (F6BA40, F6BA30) are thin-glass based that provides a limited bending radius of 75mm. The new flexible OLED panel has vastly increased the bending radius flexibility to 30mm because of the adoption of a plastic substrate for the panel, which also eliminates the danger of the panel shattering when excessive force is applied.

The main challenge of converting from a glass substrate to plastic was to maintain the performance levels of efficiency, luminance, and CRI. LG Chem has overcome this challenge by adopting its expertise in barrier and encapsulation technology.

The specifications of the LG Chem’s new plastic-based OLED light panel are 60lm/W efficiency, 75lm brightness, 3,000K in color temperature, and CRI over 85. Engineering samples are available at $250USD per panel. The mass production of the flexible panel is scheduled to begin in July 2015. The price will be adjusted accordingly once mass production starts.

JENAX, free transform flexible battery J.Flex

January 28, 2015/in Others /by OLEDNET

The markets for the bended smart phone and smart watch are to be advanced in full scale as the flexible (plastic) OLED production processes of Samsung Display and LG Display are stabilized.

Samsung Display is drawing world’s attention as releasing curved products using flexible OLED for health care gears of Galaxy Fit and Galaxy Gear S and for smartphones like Galaxy Round and Galaxy Note Edge. For LG Display’s G Flex is a product evolved from curved to bended, the internal structure of its battery also requires either curved or flexible design.

Korean company JENAX has succeeded in developing the flexible battery J.Flex following LG Chemicals and Samsung SDI. The prominent feature of J.Flex is that it can be transformed as a user wishes, allowing itself to be applied for and complement various wearable devices besides a smart watch.

The size of a smart watch battery of JENAX is 26cm x 5.2cm and the personnel from the JENAX said that it is available in various thicknesses and capacities available for the use of smart phones. And he also introduced that the battery has passed all safety tests to be applied on products.

<Flexible battery J.Flex, JENAX>

The previously released smart watches such as Galaxy Gear S and G Flex used the flexible battery which is in the bendable shape. With the development of J.Flex, the industries for the flexible displays and parts for wearable devices are expected to develop further.

[Analyst Column]The key technology to realize 8K OLED TV is transparent hybrid encapsulation technology

January 27, 2015/in Analyst column /by OLEDNET

Choong-hoon Yi / Chief Analyst / UBI Research ubiyi@ubiresearch.co.kr

Along with LG Electronics, Panasonic and Skyworth joined the UHD TV industry as releasing the 55-inch, 65-inch and 77-inch UHD OLED TVs at CES2015.

In response to this, the LCD TV manufacturers unveiled numerous new LCD TVs at CES2015 combining different technologies of QD, HDR, and curved design.

OLED is catching up with LCD in terms of resolution and LCD began to compete with OLED in respect of curvature and color.

There were competitions with regard to resolution between OLED and LCD in the history of smartphones. As the resolution of small and medium LCD improves in order to distinguish itself from OLED starting from 200ppi in 2010 to over 500ppi through the Retina (326ppi), OLED accomplished the equivalent resolution through the FMM mask and pentile technologies.

The LCD TV industries are anticipated to develop products with ultrahigh resolution in consideration of the small and medium OLED. And the OLED TV industries are reviewing the technologies to answer to this trend of ultrahigh resolution.

The resolution over 8K is available for OLED TV by either converting the bottom emission structure which is currently applied to the existing 4K OLED TV to the top emission structure with higher aperture ratio or producing the RGB OLED panel with the solution process.

Sony already developed and introduced the world’s first 4K OLED TV with the top emission technology at CES2013. Employed for Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy series, the top emission structure can be applied to a large area but the complication is in the transparent encapsulation.

It is hard to use the frit technology currently used in small and medium to a large OLED for its durability issue. The hybrid encapsulation method using the transparent encapsulation film emerges as the optimum alternative and the developments are set in that direction.

The substantial market growth is expected as the transparent hybrid encapsulation technology is critical in realizing a large area flexible OLED and transparent OLED besides the ultrahigh resolution using the top emission.

Feast of Plastic OLED

January 26, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

LG Electronics unveiled its secret weapon, G Flex2 at CES2015. Produced with the plastic OLED from LG Display, the smart phone G Flex2 features relatively enhanced resolution from the HD level resolution to FHD (403ppi) though the display has reduced from 5.99-inch to 5.5-inch when compared to the existing G Flex released in 2013.

G Flex2 is the up to date curved smart phone equipped with the latest 64bit Octa-Core CPU and Snapdragon 810 processor from Qualcomm. The frontal curvature of 700R is also the same as in the G Flex, but the backside is 650R, increasing the sense of grip. For its 700R display, it provides much better sound quality by reducing the gap between the user’s face and the phone. With the self-healing back cover as in the G Flex, it just removes various scratches occurred in daily life.

LG Electronics and Samsung Electronics sold the curved smart phones in 2013 at the same time. LG Electronics’ G Flex was the same panoramic design as now but Samsung Electronics competed by releasing a smartphone curved from left to right to emphasize a firm grip.

Medical Lighting, will it make a breakthrough for the OLED lighting market?

January 23, 2015/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

The sizable growth for OLED lighting is expected in the medical lighting market.

At Lighting Japan 2015, Synqroa Corp. introduced Lucuria, the OLED lamp used for dental practice equipment, under the presentation title “Dental-free shadow lamps development and marketing by OLED lighting source”.

The presenter Mitsuhiro Koyama, Vice President Synqroa Corp., said that “OLED lighting is more appropriate than LED or halogen lamp for the medical purposes thanks to its properties including shadow-less, good color rendering and color temperature, and no blue risk. He also speculated “The competent lighting in the medical lighting industry is more about providing the optimal environment for doctors and patients than the price competitiveness.”

Synqroa estimated that the potential for the OLED lighting panel is about six million units with expected annual demand of about 350 thousand units for maintenance assuming that each hospital will use three units (five OLED panels per unit) in about 400 thousand dentists in the world as of 2013. In addition, they also analyzed the OLED lighting panel will take about 12 million units (25% of entire demand) among the demands for the lighting panels applied in operating rooms, patient’s rooms, NICU, etc.

Likewise, the expansion of OLED lighting market is expected to gain momentum if the OLED lighting panel is employed more actively in the medical lighting market equipped with merits of improving health care environments and protecting doctors’ and patients’ eyes.

Description: Compared to the LED lighting, the OLED lighting barely emits the ultraviolet rays or blue lights which are harmful to the eyes but enables visibility closest to the natural sunlight free of shadow.

<Synqroa’s OLED lamp for Dental Equipment, Source: Synqroa>

[Analyst Column] 2015 Samsung Electronics TV Marketing Strategy Analysis: Samsung is a genius of global marketing as expected

January 21, 2015/in Analyst column /by OLEDNET

The product cited to pay close attention at this CES2015 was QD-BLU LCD TV. Exhibiting QD-BLU LCD TV at IFA 2014, the Chinese set makers already made it clear that it will be a new product to lead the Chinese market in 2015. The Chinese companies released 4K TV in the market for 2013 and it took about 60% of the world TV market in 2014.

Source: CES2015 Pre-press Conference

Mr. Koenig, the Industry Analysis Director of CEA, forecasted at CES 2015 pre-press event that the 57% of the market which is 13 million units will be in China by 2015.

Based on the domestic markets, the Chinese set companies are moving fast to secure the names implying the term QD and prepare PR and marketing strategies in order to lead the QD-BLU LCD TV market.

Succeeded in distinguishing itself from other competing companies, let alone the best TV quality in the world, Samsung Electronics took first place in the TV market share and developed the name LED TV to more strongly appeal its difference with LCD TV to potential customers. Though it is not a TV operating with LED but only the CCFL for backlight was replaced with LED, it is analyzed that this naming strategy enabled securing its competitiveness for achieving differentiation.

The Chinese set companies developed numerous TV names with the term QD imitating the successful examples of Samsung Electronics.

However, Samsung Electronics outmaneuvered the Chinese set companies again with another surprising marketing strategy. It adorned the CES 2015 press conference with the unexpected name of SUHD TV. It is because the name LED TV had a market monopolizing effect for Samsung used it exclusively for more than a year but the name QD shared with other competing companies of lesser-known brands will lower Samsung’s value as an absolute TV brand.

It seemed Samsung Electronics is emphasizing the notion of curved TV as a marketing factor to distinguish itself from other rival companies. The QD technology is a means to compete with OLED TV in terms of picture quality and it is analyzed that the curved TV is a key marketing strategy which already has secured the brand awareness as the world’s best design product in the curved TV market.

Yi Chung-hoon /Chief Analyst / UBI Research / ubiyi@ubiresearch.co.kr

Audi’s Love for OLED

January 20, 2015/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

Audi has particular affection for OLED than any other automobile companies. For instance, it has announced the concept car Audi Q7 with its rear lights using OLED light panel and the recently unveiled concept car Prologue is equipped with the flexible OLED display featuring the resolution of 8.9 x 5.6-inch 287ppi (2560 x 1600) and three sheets of rigid OLED display.

For this CES 2015, the letters of Audi was displayed three dimensionally using the OLED light source at the exhibition space intended for R8 LMX together with the phrases of ‘OLED View 2’ and ‘Audi Matrix OLED.’

According to the personnel from Audi, OLED will be used actively as a light source for it has a beautiful quality than any other light sources.

[Wearable Expo Japan 2015] A wearable to take over the future electronics industry

January 15, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

With increasing interests in wearable devices, the first Wearable Device Technology Expo 2015 was held on January 14, 2015 at the Tokyo Big Sight including the participating companies of the batteries and electric parts/materials such as a sensor, display, etc. which are to be used for wearable devices. The host announced that the event in 2016 will be about four times larger than this year proving the increased interests in associated industries and expected a drastic growth of the wearable device industry.

The first speaker of the Commemorative Session, Hideyuki Saso, the President of Fujitsu Laboratories, presented that the key for a wearable device is ICT (Information & Communication Technology) which enables every device wearable as applying a sensor and connecting system.

Tomokazu Tajima, the senior vice president of Sony, pointed out ‘co-creation’ as the keyword. He said that the issue for a wearable device is creating a new application through a co-work practice among other players in the industry. Also he estimated high market opportunities of the wearable device industry.

Among 150 companies submitted for the exhibition, WESTUNITIS showed the glasses using the micro display and PPP presented the smart glasses controlling display through hand gestures by employing a sensor and camera at the end of the glasses.

In addition, there were other wearable devices receiving fervent responses as using the glasses, smart watch and sensor including the system automatically informing the work process as linked with a display and embedded sensors in a pair of gloves and glasses, or the system operating a robot to follow the movements of a human wearing the device with a sensor installed in the arm area.

<West units’s wearable device>

<PPP’s smart glasses>

CURVED, the keyword for Samsung Electronics in 2015

January 15, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

The principal design for the TVs and monitors exhibited in the Samsung Electronics booth at CES 2015 can be summed up as ‘curved.’ Starting from the OLED TV at the TV market, the LCD TV also announced a variety of curved designs and bendable TV with adjustable curvature.

Furthermore, Samsung Electronics presented 27inch and 34inch SEC 790C monitors introducing the concept of curved design in a monitor. The 34inch ultra-wide curved monitor is a 21:9 aspect ratio featuring a resolution of 3,440 x 1,440 pixels (ultra WQHD) with the static contrast ratio of 3,000:1. The curvature is 3,000R and the wide viewing angle is 178°.

Securing various products with curved properties from TV and smart watch to monitor, Samsung Electronics positions as a leading company pioneering the curved electronics.

<Samsung Electronics curved monitor (L) and multivision display with standard monitors connected (R)>

[Lighting Japan 2015]What is the keyword for the next lighting industry?

January 15, 2015/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

The Lighting Japan 2015 was held on January 14, 2015 at the Tokyo Big Sight in Japan.

At the key note session, Jeffrey Cassis, the senior vice president of Phillips, began the first presentation with the theme of “Delivering the Promise and potential of digital light” emphasizing the notion of digital lighting and connected lighting in terms of the critical issue of how to combine a lighting with a smart city and ecosystem. He also hinted the importance of OLED lighting mentioning that most of the Philips’ R&D is concentrated on OLED despite the fact that the LED lighting will take about 65% of the entire lighting market by 2018.

The second speaker Prof. Ching W Tang from the Hong Kong University expressed “the sympathy with his view on the digital lighting that the OLED lighting will play a critical role” and highlighted the key issue is preparing for the price competiveness. He mentioned that the efficiency of current OLED lighting panel is about 23% and there is a potential to improve up to about 30%. Also he added that there will be a huge renovation in the lighting market if the total efficiency of the OLED lighting panel increases more than 50%.

As demonstrated in the key note session, the key for the future lighting industry can be summarized as both connectivity and OLED. The concept of connectivity which was underlined by the numerous electronics and automobile companies at the last CES 2015 is becoming a primary trend in the lighting industry and it is anticipated to center around the OLED lighting.

<Philips senior vice president Jeffrey Cassis>

<Hong Kong Univ. Prof. Ching W. Tang >

[CES2015] How far LCD TV will evolve?

January 12, 2015/in Focus on, Set /by OLEDNET

LCD TV made another great innovation. It is the LED BLU using Quantum dot(QD) accomplishing an ultimate level of LCD TV picture quality that no one has imagined yet.

At CES2015, the TV-set companies including LG Electronics, Sony, Sharp, TCL, Haier, etc. revealed the QD-BLU LCD TV. Their color reproducibility had reached up to NTSV 110% due to QD-LED and the brightness and contrast range allowed a brilliant picture quality which was never available in the LCD panel as a result of HDR (high dynamic range) technology.

There were only a few exhibitions prese nting the night view of clear contrast range but at this CES 2015, Samsung Electronics demonstrated how far the LCD TV has improved by comparing the contrast ranges of the SUHD TV (up) and existing LCD TV.

In addition, the exterior design has changed completely different from the existing LCD TV in the curved and thin film shape under 10mm. Even the viewing angle of wide color LCD attained a level of spontaneous emission

How far LCD TV will evolve?

The answer was in this CES 2015.

It is the OLED TV.

LG Display is the only company in the world capable of producing OLED panel and at this moment, it is LG Electronics which has a capacity to mass-produce OLED TV.

The superiority of OLED panel’s color reproducibility, contrast range, response time, viewing angle, thickness, etc. over LCD was already attested in the smart phone Galaxy series. Therefore, the survival means for those TV manufactures which cannot produce OLED TV is to make LCD TV most similar to OLED TV as much as possible until they can supply a large quantity of OLED panel.

At this CES2015, LG Electrons mobilized every technology available for LCD TV to go after OLED TV. The LCD TV came close to OLED TV with a curved design despite the color reproducibility, viewing angle, thickness and getting thicker. In particular, the contrast range has enhanced to such a degree that it is indistinguishable with OLED TV if no explanation is provided. But after all, LCD is LCD and OLED is OLED. It might imitate but cannot be the same.

The opportunity for LCD TV to transform once again by the emergence of OLED TV will go down in history of TV as an example of proper competition.

[CES2015] Samsung’s love for OLED is at cross with that of LG

January 12, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

OLED is the only electronic appliance made in Korea which is commensurate with the modifiers such as the world’s first, best and most. It is even dominate not by one but by two major companies in both mobile device and TV categories, contending for supremacy in the flexible (plastic) device area as well.

But the periods that Samsung Display and LG Display have commercialized the OLED panel are completely different. Samsung Display is leading the small AMOLED panel produced on a glass substrate. LG Display took part in the initial stage but closed the business before long. Since then, Samsung Display is running alone, eagerly seeking a partner to compete in good faith for the development of OLED business.

The situation is reversed in the OLED TV. Taking a lesson from the failure in the AMOLED for mobile business and with adamant determination, LG Display succeeded in commercializing a large OLED panel available for the UHD TV using the oxide TFT, WRGB OLED, and hybrid encapsulation technologies that no one had thought of before. On the other hand, Samsung Display, the first of OLED, ceased mass-producing a large OLED panel and went into a long hibernation. Now LG Display is running a long marathon course on its own. The lonely sole lead in the TV market which is a flower of display industry is expected to continue for few years.

At CES2015, LG Electronics organized the booth focused on the curved UHD OLED TV, G Flex2, and G Watch employing OLED panels and to promote the excellence of OLED TV, it also prepared a section to compare the picture quality and viewing angle with LCD TV.

Samsung Electronics planned its booth concentrating on the SUHD TV which is the QD-BLU LCD TV, but there was a picture quality comparison section to judge against existing LCD, OLED, and PDP TV.

Samsung Electronics, which once promoted OLED as the best picture quality, now turned its back on OLED TV and began to exploit it in order to highlight the SUHD TV as a desperate measure. The OLED TV and PDP TV at the exhibition presented poor picture qualities compared to the SUHD TV without a doubt. However, the OLED TV which was used for comparison is said to be a product of Samsung and thus, it ironically demonstrated that Samsung Display’s manufacturing technique for a large OLED panel is inferior to that of LG Display, expecting to have a negative impact on the future OLED business of Samsung Display. Because it was obvious in the LG Electronics booth that anyone who saw the OLED TV in there was able to realize a superb picture quality of LG’s OLED panel for TV.

The view on LG’s OLED has clearly distinct at the LG Display press conference held on the eve of CES2015 opening. The platform was checkered with LG Display’s logo and the word OLED, presenting a strong will that LG Display will take a full responsibility of OLED.

The biggest accomplishment of CES2015 is that it was an opportunity to confirm the possibility of the sustained growth of Korean display industry as the industrial infrastructures are established to produce from a small panel for mobile device to a large area OLED panel even if LG Display and Samsung Display pursue different areas in the OLED panel industry.

Why Hybrid Encapsulation?

January 12, 2015/in Focus on, Technology /by OLEDNET

The latest trends in the display market can be represented with the keywords such as flexible, large panel and high resolution. And companies are releasing the products applying a flexible AMOLED panel like Galaxy Note Edge, Galaxy Gear S, and G Watch R and high-resolution products applying a large area panel such as UHD curved 65- and 77- inch in the AMOLED market. For Flexible AMOLED panel, foldable and rollable features are required whereas the resolution over UHD level and the brightness at least 500nit are required for a large area AMOLED panel.

There still are many issues to be resolved to mass-produce a flexible AMOLED panel and a large area AMOLED panel with the resolution above UHD level. Especially the encapsulation is a technology deemed to transform as the OLED manufacturing technology changes and it is a very critical area for it is the last process determining the panel yield rate.

Encapsulation is essential process to prevent emitting and electrode materials from being oxidized as it blocks moisture and oxygen flowing in from the outside of OLED element, and protects elements from mechanical and physical impacts from outside.

According to the “OLED Encapsulation Report” issued by the UBI Research on the 5^th, the key encapsulation technology applicable for every application is expected to be the hybrid encapsulation.

The Hybrid Encapsulation structured with a thin-film passivation, a cover plate with a gas barrier property, and polymer to adhere a thin-film passivation and cover plate in two applications ? the ‘Dam & Fill’ uses polymer in liquid form while the ‘Film Laminating’ uses it as processed in film form.

The frit glass method which is employed in the rigid AMOLED for a mobile device currently on sale is a perfect encapsulation method but it is hard to be applied to a large panel and flexible AMOLED. The TFE (Thin Film Encapsulation) technology which is applied to some flexible AMOLED is also inapplicable for a large panel due to the complicated process of forming a multilayer thin film, the occurrence of particle, and the problem of film uniformity.

However, the hybrid encapsulation is valid for both a large panel and flexible OLEDs with the advantage that the number of process is less than that of TFE. UBI research analyzed that the hybrid encapsulation using a transparent gas barrier can be applied to a rigid AMOLED panel for a mobile device for the benefits of preventing breaks and reducing thickness.

As the hybrid encapsulation is applied in a large area OLED and flexible OLED panels which is to be the core of future OLED industry, UBI Research prospected the main material market for hybrid encapsulation to form US$600 billion in 2015 and to show CAGR of 74% between 2015-2020. The primary materials applied in the hybrid encapsulation are organic materials, metal foil and transparent gas barrier.

[CES2015] Keyword for this event is “connectivity”

January 10, 2015/in Focus on, Set /by OLEDNET

With only two more days left, CES 2015’s biggest concern can be characterized in one word “connectivity”” Until now, CES welcomed visitors with thousands of booths presenting a wide variety of electronics commensurate with the reputation of the event as the best electronics show in the world. The space connecting Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics, Sony, and Panasonic was the largest area occupying the event, devoted to hardware such as audio, cellphone, etc. besides TV. For ten years, the exhibited functions were of connecting a home from outside using a smart TV with internet and two-way communication but the recent trend introduces functions controlling appliances at home with individual cellphones from outside. Add to this the development of ‘Internet of Things’ as a key technology magnified the issue of the “connective technology” at this CES.

The most outstanding feature of CES2015 is the participation of renowned automobile companies, showing off numerous spectacles as combining an electronics exhibition with automobile exhibition. It is because an automobile from a mechanical perspective of opening doors and starting a car before driving, and controlling a handle, gear and pedals while driving has evolved to the extent of becoming an electronics with the explosion of connected functions as applying various components used in electronics including the Internet of Things technology, HUD, touch screen, sensor, etc. and automation function such as software technology, unmanned driving system, etc. The biggest influence on converting a car into an electronics is the “connective technology”, linking a hu man and a car.

Benz presented the future concept car F015, demonstrating how a car will be used in the future society while Audi enabled touch controlling of an automobile system and Hyundai revealed the unmanned driving system as well as the technology of automatically controlling a car through a sensor as display on the HUD (head-up-display) in real time of the diverse road environments expected to encounter while driving.

The world of automobile has improved to such a degree to connect a smart device like a smartphone and smart watch to start a car without a key. Of course these smart devices are already developing the embedded health care function of measuring HR (heart rate).

This CES 2015 proves the realization of a new world of in our lives connecting a smartphone, a wearable device, an automobile, and others focused on a human.

[CES2015] Panasonic and Skyworth to actively participate in OLED TV business

January 9, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

Han Sang-beom, the CEO of LG Display said at CES 2015 press conference that the OLED TV market for this year is expected to be about 600 thousand units, declaring to m ake 2015 the first year for WRGB OLED TV. LG Display plans to produce 55-inch, 65-inch and 77-inch UHD Curved OLED panels as deploying 14,000 Gen-8 substrates per month at both the M1 line and M2 line by the first half year, and will expand to 26,000 sheets per month by the end of the year.

Though LG Electronics purchases about 90% of the OLED panels produced by LG Display, the participation of the set companies of Japan and China are desperate in order to form a market in a country with a large purchasing power including Japan and China. In China, Skyworth is very active in the sales of the OLED TV. In this event, Skyworth exhibited the 65-inch and 55-inch curved UHD OLED TV. Mr. Mars Yang, the marketing manager of Skyworth, suggested that while only two models of FHD OLED TV were launched in 2014, total four models including 55-in curved UHD OLED TV will be released in 2015 for the Chinese market.

In Japan, Panasonic has a great interest in the OLED TV market. Exhibiting the independently developed 55-inch soluble process curved UHD OLED TV from CES 2013 to IFA 2014, Panasonic places a very high value in OLED TV. Panasonic is currently developing a TV set from 2014 as purchasing OLED from LG Display besides the OLED panel that it is working on separately, and at CES 2015, it has presented the curved OLED TV produced with the 55-inch UHD OLED panel from the LG Display. The exact date was not revealed but the personnel from Panasonic exhibition said that they are expecting to release the OLED TV soon, and the purpose of this exhibition is to demonstrate the possibility to create a beautiful screen as such with OLED TV. These two companies are establishing the TV trend with LG Electronics emphasizing the keywords of ‘UHD’ and ‘curved’.

OLED TV is getting attention at this CES 2015 as it is thinner and wider in its viewing angle compared to the QD-BLU LCD TV using BLU. In particular, the LG Display’s UHD OLED panel which was unveiled this time is capable of realizing the brightness equal to the best quality LCD TV as its peak intensity is raised up to 800nit. LG Display has been highly praised for the best display in this event as releasing the product with improved features of brightness and black.

[CES2015] Samsung Press Conference Highlights

January 7, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

Recap of CES 2014

Before all the new announcements in the U.S., the audiences were briefly reminded couple things that happened in 2014.

-Samsung shared its vision for Home of the Future, a lifestyle-based innovation that will extend across the overall eco-system

-Samsung Electronics Honored with 36 CES Innovation Awards including 2 Best of Innovation awards (Bendable S-UHD TV, Galaxy Note Edge) and 4 Eco-Design honors across all the business categories.

-Samsung outperformed in the US market with two digit number growth in sales and believes that it reached more loyal consumers.

-Samsung successfully established a new television category ? Curved UHD.

-Samsung introduced CHEF Collection, a new generation of appliances

Key Announcements

Similar to the prior CES, Samsung has announced many new innovative products such as TVs, home appliances and more. Here are some of the key points of each new announcements.

#1 Samsung Portable SSD T1

-Smaller than a business card, it weighs less than an ounce

-Four times faster than the traditional external drive

-Holds up to a terabyte of data

#2 Milk Music, Video & VR

-Milk started as an intuitive music-discovery app for millions of active users worldwide.

-MILK Video allows you to discover, collect, and share all of the web’s best videos, seamlessly, in one place.

-In 2015, Samsung is expanding MILK to Samsung Smart TVs, and MILK Music to the web.

-Milk VR is an exclusive service for Gear VR with a daily stream of immersive, 360 degree videos.

-Milk VR is available for download right now from the Oculus store on the Samsung Gear VR.

-Samsung is launching with 100 minutes of original content and will deliver 10 new videos per week, from music, sports, to action and lifestyle.

#3 Curved S-UHD TV

-This is Samsung’s first SUHD TV and it is 88-inch!

-The SUHD display is made from Samsung’s proprietary nano-crystal semiconductors

-It delivers the highest color purity and light efficiency available today.

-Quantum Color technology gives 64 times the color expression of conventional TVs for the most accurate color display.

#4 Smart TV

-From this year, all Samsung Smart TV’s ? including our SUHD TV ? will be powered by the Tizen operating system, which is based on web standards

-The “first screen menu” simplifies the Smart TV experience whether you control your TV with a remote, or voice, or gestures.

-Samsung Quick Connect instantly links up devices to your TV.

-Smart TV offers easy and seamless navigation across videos, games and the web, giving you more choices than ever on the TV screen

-Samsung Sports Live brings the second-screen experience on to the main screen and provides near real-time stats about the team and the players

-Samsung partnered up with PlayStation Now, which lets you stream&play blockbuster games without a console, and multiscreen games

#5 WAM7500/6500

-The newly-introduced 8500 series will also offer enhanced sound quality with its 9.1 channel speakers

-It provides omni-directional experience

-Samsung’s ring radiator technology projects sound in all directions, vertically and horizontally.

-Multiroom App 2.0, which uses the Milk interface.

CHEF Collection phase 2

#6 Chef Collection App

-This app is updated every two weeks, and packed with recipes and tips from these incredible Michelin-starred chefs as well as partners

-It is like having your own Michelin-starred adviser next to you

-The Chef Collection App will be available for free on Google Play starting in February.

#7 Flex Duo with Dual Door

-The Flex Duo with Dual Door aims to deliver efficient use of compartments incorporating top Chefs’ direct feedback on usability as well as efficiency.

-The upper door provides access to a small top compartment.

-The full door opens both the top and bottom compartments, when the Smart Divider is slotted in.

#8 WA8700 Top-load washer with activ dualwashTM & SuperSpeedTM

-Samsung is the innovator and clear industry leader, with the highest capacity washers and dryers on the market, and phenomenal energy efficiency across the board.

-A new built-in sink, complete with water jet and scrubber makes doing the laundry easier ? while still maintaining load capacity.

-One-stop solution for all your laundry needs

-Activewash is also our first top loader to feature Super Speed technology, which reduces the wash time for a normal load to as little as 36 minutes.

-For the first time on top-load washers, WA8700 features SuperSpeedTM enabling users to save more “me” time.

-Wash Sink and Water Jet make it all possible ? one-stop solution.

#9 PowerBot Robot V/C

-The new Powerbot has 60 times more suction power compared with conventional robot vacuum cleaners.

-It will create a complete map of the home to calculate the most efficient c

leaning path, thanks to Visionary Mapping Plus.

[CES2015] Samsung, the hero of INNOVQTION AWARDS!

January 6, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

The core products of the 2015 exhibition were released at the CES Unveiled event including various mobile devices equipped with different high-tech sensors like a drone. The 20 most innovative products selected by the CES were awarded at this event.

Among those products, Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy Note Edge won in the “wireless headsets” section and Dell’s Venue 8 7000 tablet PC with Samsung Display’s AMOLED panel received the award in the category of “e-readers and mobile computing.”

150105_CES2015 INNOVQTION AWARDS의 주인공들에는 삼성이 있다_2

LG Chem. release 320x320mm OLED lighting and new application

January 6, 2015/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

The 320x320mm OLED light panel in LG Chem’s product portfolio in the world’s largest commercially available panel. The panel has an efficacy of 60lm/W, a high CRI (90) and is only 0.88mm thick. The output, which is similar to common 60-75 Watt incandescent lamp. This is significant because it marks the point where OLEDs will not only be seen as an energy-efficient and human friendly light source, but also come to be seen as a fit-for-purpose and proficient general purpose light source. The 320x320mm panel is now commercially available.

LG Chem has developed two types of “Mounting Solutions” for easy OLED panel installation with magnetic connections: Rail Connection and Linear Connection.

Rail connection

Each 200x50mm LG Chem OLED light panel is cased and a DC-DC driver is integrated. The AC-DC driver supplies DC to the conductor rail, and each lighting unit is magnetically attached to the rail receiving the power.

Linear Connection

The Linear Connection Solution also utilized 200x50mm OLED panels with chrome-finished casing. Each lighting unit is magnetically connected with other units in a series, and the units are also magnetically attached to the metal surface. When distance between the panels is required, and extension bar can be placed in between.

The mounting solutions can be easily applied anywhere, from retail store shelving to general home furniture.

The Transparent Electrode uses 320x110mm OLED panels. A transparent mesh conductive film, OLED panel and protection film are laminated on a sheet of glass. Hence, OLEDs turn on without direct wiring to the panels; therefore achieve a floating effect. The Transparent Electrode would be a great fit for retail shelving where temperature is a sensitive factor for instance in the cases of cosmetics of food. Different shapes and sizes of OLEDs can be applied diverse design needs.

[CES2015]LG Press Conference Highlight

January 6, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

Tim Alessi, director of new product development at LG Electronics USA, unveils LG’s new 77″ Flexible 4K OLED TV during a news conference at the 2015 International CES on Monday, Jan. 5, 2015, in Las Vegas.

Greg Peters, chief streaming and partnerships officer at Netflix, left, and Tim Alessi, director of new product development at LG Electronics USA, shake hands celebrating their continued partnership in front of LG’s 77″ Flexible 4K OLED TV during a news conference at the 2015 International CES on Monday, Jan. 5, 2015, in Las Vegas.

David VanderWaal_TWIN Wash SystemDavid VanderWaal, LG Electronics USA, introduces the new LG TWIN Wash System with a first-of-its-kind mini washer in the pedestal during a news conference at the 2015 International CES on Monday, Jan. 5, 2015, in Las Vegas.

David VanderWaal, LG Electronics USA, unveils the first-of-its-kind Double Door-in-Door refrigerator during a news conference at the 2015 International CES on Monday, Jan. 5, 2015, in Las Vegas.

Frank Lee, LG MobileComm USA, unveils the new G Flex2 smartphone during a news conference at the 2015 International CES on Monday, Jan. 5, 2015, in Las Vegas. It is the first phone to be available with a Snapdragon 810 processor.

[CES2015] Prelude of the war without gunfire and border

January 6, 2015/in Set /by OLEDNET

CES is held around this time every year for the first time in the world. Though it will run from January 6^th to 9^th, the journalists are provided with enough time to review projected topics of CES from the 4^th.

At the pre-CES press event in the January 4^th, Dr. Dubrava c, chief economist and senior director of Research for CEA (Consumer Electronic Association) mentioned the pillars to the digital era under the title “2015 CES Trends to Watch”, and those five pillars are “ubiquitous computing”, “cheap digital storage”, “connectivity”, “proliferation of digital devices”, and “’sensor’ization of tech.”

Among those, Dr. Dubravac presented the notion of “digitization”, “connection”, and “sensor’ization” as key issues of which the keywords are in digitalizing physical space of human, and prospected that the “watch” will be a primary means to connect these.

Dr. Dubravac concluded stating the necessity to deliberate the “big questions” of 2015 with regard to “what will happen when everything is digitalized”, “how to provide connectivity”, “the arrangement and installation location of a sensor” and “what a use-case scenario is.”

In the presentation titled “Technology World Tour”, following speaker Steve Koenig, an executive of the industry analysis team, picked a smartphone as a technology available to continuously develop the electronic industry. He remarked the seven major electronics as a smartphone as well as mobile phone, LCD TV, mobile PC, desk PC, digital still camera, tablet PC, and said that the smartphone is taking 40 percent of the entire market which is three times more than the second placed LCD TV of 13 percent in 2014, predicting the share will increase up to 46% by 2015. However, it was expected that the set price will be reduces drastically given that the 34 percent of the smartphone market is in China and the dominating control of Chinese companies like One Plus, Xiaomi, and Coolpad over the Chinese market.

He also presupposed that smart watch, health & fitness tech, smart home technologies, and automotive technologies will form a new market in a mobile device industry.

The global TV market is steadily increasing as the average size got bigger in 42-inch but about 60% of the 4K TV market is in China. It expected to grow in the size of total 2.3 million units by 2015.

But there was no reference as to the quantum dot backlight LCD TV (QD BLU LCD TV) which was anticipated as this year’s topic, and CEA estimated that the curved TV market will grow to 3.4 million units increased by 245% compared to the previous year, implying ambiguous future for the QD BLU LCD TV.

[Analyst Column] Watch issued for the promotion of QD-LED BLU LCD TV

December 30, 2014/in Analyst column, Focus on /by OLEDNET

Lately, the media, research institutes and stock firms are scrambling to release data on the marketability of QD-LCD TV which is the LCD TV applying the QD (quantum dot) materials to the LED backlight. In the strict sense, it is not a LCD technology but a backlight technology. The QD-LCD BLU (backlight unit) can be divided into the three types; one is applying the QD material directly to the LED chip, another is arranging it in front of the LED chip; and lastly it is placing it in between LCD and Light Guide Plate after filming by inserting the QD materials to the barrier film.

Source: Wikimedia,

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:QDEF_Exploded_Diagram.png

The QD-LED BLU is being recognized as a LCD TV technology that can compete with the OLED TV as it has a merit to improve the color reproducibility up to about 12 percent compared to the existing LED BLU. Until now, the LCD TV manufacturers take the notion of resolution as a major marketing means to compete with other products like PDP. And it was the same with the OLED case. However, the Apple iPhone highlighted the resolution as the biggest difference with the Galaxy S of Samsung Electronics but Samsung Electronics counter attacked with the color reproducibility as overcoming the resolution issue with the pentile technology, ranking the first in the market share. The LCD TV part, presenting the 4K and 8K TVs continuously, expected that the OLED TV won’t be able to catch up but LG Display is planning to come into the market from 2015 as developing the 4K OLED panel in the 55-inch with the oxide TFT and WRGB OLED technologies.

Given that the superiority of the OLED panel’s picture quality over that of LCD was verified through Samsung Electronics’ Galaxy S and LG Electronics’ OLED TV, the best way to defense for the companies with no available OLED TV to sell is the early release of QD-LED BLU LCD TV with the improved color reproducibility.

The products applying new technologies have been well received in the market. The problem is that promoting the QD-LED BLU LCD TV to the extent of highlighting excessively may cause the distortion of a market or capital. For instance, the domestic stock firms are indeed reporting that the QD-LED BLU LCD TV as a highly eco-friendly product with an efficient energy consumption. But it is known that the brightness of the QD-LED BLU LD TV is 30 percent less than the existing LED BLU LCD TV. If the brightness decreases, it requires more LED chip and more driving modules as well, raising the production cost. Moreover, it emits more heat in proportion to the added amount of LED chips, increasing the corresponding cost for heat dissipation.

It is expected that the application of the QD-LED BLU will be limited to the premium products as there are numerous factors causing the increase of the production cost in varied channels. Though it is true that the QD-LED BLU can provide better picture quality than the LCD TV, it must be clarified that it is not the product surpassing the LCD TV.

And the careful attention of various media in using the name ‘QD TV’ is needed in that it might confuse general customers. The QD technology is also a very fascinating and appealing technology for the OLED developers. They are already developing the OLED panel using the QD materials and the blue elements in the field of OLED panel manufacturing technology. Then, this OLED TV eventually becomes the QD TV. Accordingly, it must be noted that any reports written without the clear understanding of QD may cause a considerable social repercussion in the display market.

Choong-hoon Yi / Chief Analyst / UBI Research ubiyi@ubiresearch.co.kr

Sony, unveiled a high-resolution single-lens OLED module

December 19, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

Sony developed a glasses-style smart device of a single-lens display module.

<Single-lens display module>

Source: Sony

<(top) sample field of vision, (bottom) module attached to eyewear piece>

Source: Sony

This module was designed by Sony to be a small and light weight glasses-style composed of OLED microdisplay, micro-optical unit, and miniaturized control board.

It is the smallest display module as a 0.23-inch high-resolution (640×480) OLED microdisplay. The contrast ratio is over 10,000:1 with 100% sRGB. Generally the RGB stripe is used to secure the color purity, but this panel uses the optimized matrix configuration.

<Display arm of the module>

Source: Sony

OLED TV, becomes the Quantum Dot TV just by placing a dot in the name?

December 16, 2014/in Market /by OLEDNET

Though they are a part of sales gimmick, extremely deluding names are emerging.

For OLED TV, the technology name “OLED” makes it easier for a consumer to recognize the differences of TVs precisely as it uses the OLED panel which is a spontaneous emission method employed to realize brightness and color. In the beginning of last year, LG Electronics and Samsung Electronics made it clear that it is not LCD TV by literally using the term ‘OLED TV’ for the TVs manufactured using OLED panel. But for LED TV, it should be named as LCD TV adopting LED BLU. The LED TV is the one that controls light only with LED.

The name LED TV was a dangerous concept allowing for that it is safe to deceive general customers to sell products. This concern reoccurs for the LCD TV employing the quantum dot technology. As the LCD TV adopting the quantum dot technology emerges as a new rising star of the TV market, the TV set producers are planning to ship the products under the names of QD TV, QLED TV, or Q Dot TV. While they are naming the LCD product as if it is a new TV made only with the quantum dot while in reality, the quantum dot technology is added to the LED backlight to improve the color reproducibility and power consumption.

The worst name is “QLED TV” which was created just by putting a dot in the OLED TV. It is assumed to be the combination of the terms LED TV and quantum dot. But it is very similar to the name ‘OLED TV’ that commonly recognized as the next generation TV to the extent of confusing as OLED TV.

In the TV market that becomes more and more competitive as time passes, the differentiation strategy is crucial to make a distinction with other companies. However, this immoral and disgraceful trick of playing with consumers with naming must be stopped. Like an automobile company gets a considerable penalty for selling a car with false mileage, the strict sanctions must be imposed upon TV manufacturers using names to deceive customers.

[Analyst Column] G Watch R and Galaxy Gear S Structures and Disassembling Video

December 11, 2014/in Analyst column /by OLEDNET

G Watch R and Galaxy Gear S by LG Electronics and Samsung Electronics respectively were disassembled to see their structures. First of all, much of the internal and external design concepts were quite similar. Claiming to be the classical sports type watch, the G Watch R is a smart watch emphasizing the sense of watch rather than its diverse smart functions while Galaxy Gear S was produced with a design of fashion watch. From dismantling both products, it was revealed that for G Watch R, the plastic OLED display which corresponds to the plate of watch is attached to the glass of the watch as shown by removing the back plate by unscrewing from the back side just like a regular watch and internal components, but for Galaxy Gear S, the flexible OLED panel was attached to the front side with adhesive so that the window detaches as applying heat to the front side.

<LG Electronics G Watch R>

Source: OLEDNET

< Samsung Electronics Galaxy Gear S>

Source: OLEDNET

In terms of the module design aspect including display, G Watch R shows dualised touch whereas Galaxy Gear S shows neatly unified look as FPCB. As the flexible OLED that Samsung Display is producing uses the touch screen of on-cell method, there is only one FPCB but for the plastic OLED of LG Display, it has the touch of add-on method, expected to have two FPCB to give signals.

<Panel of Gear S (Left) and G Watch R (Right)>

Source: OLEDNET

The radiation design is critical in the smart watch as a variety of components are concentrated in it. In case of G Watch R, the sections for the plastic OLED and electronic components are divide with a radiation sheet in between. For Galaxy Gear S, there is a small radiation sheet in the plastic component which separates the metal Foil assumed to be the Cu film to reduce heat generated from the display in the back side of display (refer to the image above) and component.

<Gear S (Left) and G Watch R (Right)’s Module>

Source: OLEDNET

Overall, the conclusion drawn from disassembling both products analyzed that G Watch R took the design of classical watch not only for the look but also the internal structures while Galaxy Gear S, the strong one in the smart phone market, seems to be a fashionable device inheriting the genes of a smart phone.

Yi Choong-hoon /Chief Analyst / UBI Research / ubiyi@ubiresearch.co.kr

OLED displays mounted in Audi’s Prologue Concept Car

December 3, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

Audi’s Prologue Concept car comes with flexible and rigid OLED displays.

According to OLED-Info, Prologue concept car with two-door design features one flexible OLED and three rigid OLED displays. The flexible display made by Samsung Display is 8.9 x 5.6 inch in size and has a resolution of 28ppi (2560×1600).

Audi is well known for its excellent exterior designs including lamps in the auto industry, and is also the most active auto manufacturer in using OLED lighting panels to produce lamps.

[Audi Prologue equipped with OLED displays]

[Audi Q7 featuring OLED lighting]

LG ‘OLED TV’, received ‘CES Innovation award for three consecutive years

November 28, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

LG Electronics won the ‘CES 2015’ Innovation Award for the ‘flexible OLED TV’ and ‘G3’.

So this marks the third year in a row that LG’s ‘OLED TV’ and ‘G Series’ have earned CES Innovation Awards. These products have never lost the CES Innovation Awards since their release in 2012. For the ‘CES 2013’, ‘flat OLED TV’ and ‘G3’ have received the awards, and it was ’77-inch ultra OLED TV’ and ‘G2’ that won the ‘CES 2014’.

LG Elec.’s ‘flexible OLED TV’ was designed to let users control the angle of curvature using a remote controller. It is possible to adjust to the maximum curvature as comprehensively considering the flat to the size of screen, viewing distance, etc. It offers the optimal viewing experiences depending on the TV viewing environments and conditions as it is allowed to adjust to the curvature of users’ choices.

Employing the best technologies available, LG’s ‘G3’ is a smartphone focused on providing the best user experience using most convenient ways. It is favorably reviewed by the domestic and foreign media and consumers highly praised as such the best picture quality enabled by the Quad HD IPS display, laser autofocus camera using a laser beam for a quick focus function, simple yet elegant exterior design, real smartphone UX (user interface) understanding users, etc.

LG Electronics has won from the total ten sections in the ‘CES 2015’ Innovation Award including four from

TVs, two IT products like a monitor, cellphone, etc., and four from home appliances.

The next ‘CES Innovation Award’ will nominate the winner from the products submitted to the world’s biggest home appliances exhibition ‘CES (Consumer Electronics Show)’ which will be held in January in Las Vegas and those will be evaluated in terms of technology and design by CEA and IDSA.

Source : LG Electronics.

Samsung, uncovered the Healthcare specialized smartwatch Simband

November 28, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

CNET reported on the release of Samsung’s wearable device the Simband at the Samsung Developer Conference held in San Francisco.

The prior Simband launched early May of this year was not a smartwatch type but a health band design with the function focused on health tracking to collect vast amount of data for researchers or medical specialists. Furthermore, it had a wide range of medical demands and sensor technologies, and in particular, it used SAMI cloud solution that collects and analyzes Samsung’s sensor-based health data.

Similar to the previous model, this Simband constantly measures medical data from various sensors. The display provides information as to heart rate, blood pressure, body temperature, amount of co2 and oxygen as well as blood pressure simulation.

<Simband that Samsung disclosed at the Developer Conference, Source ? CNET>

Samsung stated that this Simband is strengthened with the sensor, algorithm, and waterproof functions. Though the specifics concerning the display was not mentioned, it is considered that the AMOLED panel for the Gear S was used given that it is curved display and 2 inches.

Source – CNET

Bernd Unrecht releases suspended lamp “Adjust S-OLED”

November 28, 2014/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

Bernd Unrecht, a German lighting company, introduced the “Adjust” series of OLED light panels that emit glare-free and diffuse light into their surroundings. They come in three sizes (3, 6, or 12 OLED panels).

The OLED panels used for the “Adjust” series emit warm-white light (3,000K) and features a high CRI of 90, a brightness level of 3,000 cd/m2, and a lifetime of 40,000 hours. The power consumption is 2.55W (150lm). These are 14×14 cm OLED panels with a 12.9×12.9 cm active area.

Given their features, it is assumed that LG Chem’s N6SC30, one of the company’s square type products, is used.

Solution-processed OLED to be commercialized in years

November 28, 2014/in Market /by OLEDNET

A solution-processable OLED technology is the one of its kinds that can RGB panels by using mother glasses for Gen 6 or later OLED panels. After some improvements are made to the properties of materials and definition, solution-processed OLED products will be manufactures in years to come.

So far, the existing solution process technology with a resolution of 200ppi could not be applied to smartphones and tablet PCs requiring a higher definition. With the development of the new technology that can feature a resolution of up to 300ppi, however, the solution process can become applied to tablet PCs with the potential for rapid growth.

In addition, it is possible that solution process technology is utilized to manufacture ultra HD 4K and even 8K (7680×4320) TV panels. The 65-inch 8K (7680×4320) panels are expected to feature a resolution of approximately 140 ppi. The manufacturing of panels that can produce an image of 200 ppi or higher will lead to the production of high-definition RGB LED TV panels.

Given that the 10.5-inch panels using the recently released AMOLED panels have a resolution of 287 ppi and use a Pentile layout, tablet PC panels with a RGB layout will be manufactured by using the solution process technology.

[Analyst Column] Solution Process OLED to be released from 2016

November 28, 2014/in Analyst column, Focus on /by OLEDNET

The possibility to mass produce AMOLED panel in RGB structure by solution process was confirmed after the appearance of the solution process 4K OLED TV by Panasonic in 2013 and as AUO unveils the 65-inch FHD AMOLED panel at SID 2104 which uses hybrid process of employing inkjet printing method and deposition method simultaneously.

According to the Solution Process OLED Report 2014 issued by the UBI Research on the 26^th, it is expected to release AMOLED panel by solution process by 2016 considering the stages of the process equipment and materials developments up to now.

The solution process is producing OLED by printing the material of liquid condition. The efficiency of the material usage in case of the existing RGB deposition method is as low as about 10%, requiring complicated processes and it is difficult to apply to the large area substrate.

The efficiency is theoretically 100% for the solution process, resulting cost saving and even the process of RGB method without cutting the substrate at the 8^thgeneration line is possible.

However, there are remaining issues to be resolved as the material property is low compared to the deposition material and it is unavailable to produce high resolution panel.

The personnel from the UBI Research reported that the analysis shows the probability to produce from 8.4-inch FHD panel to 8K high resolution panel over 30 inches in RGB method for it is possible to print up to 300ppi as the printing error reduces. The present OLED panel for tablet PC has a resolution of about 262ppi because it was produced in PenTile method. Now, the large area panel as well as the RGB OLED panel for tablet PC are mass produces as a result of the solution process allowing up to 300ppi.

[Figure : The scope of panel available for the solution peocess]

Also the property of emitting material was improved. Assumed from the analysis of properties announced so far, the efficiencies of red and green among other emitting materials for the solution process are developed close to the deposition material. Especially for the green, the small molecular material for the solution process appears to be more efficient than the polymer material for the deposition.

“Considering the development level of the material and process equipment for the solution process, the AMOLED panel produced in the solution process will be released actively from 2016, and in view of the current line conditions of panel companies, the investment ability, and technical situations, it is expected to produce the AMOLED panel for the tablet PC at first” said the personnel from the UBI Research.

In addition, the AMOLED panel market for the solution process will be the size of $380 million with the average annual growth rate of 141% by 2017 as the material for the solution process is anticipated to have the full competitiveness by the same year.

Yi Choong-hoon /Chief Analyst / UBI Research / ubiyi@ubiresearch.co.kr

BMW’s Luxury Sedan, ‘BMW Vision Future Luxury’ is furnished with OLED at rear

November 26, 2014/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

On the 11^th, BMW Korea announced that the ‘BMW Vision Future Luxury’ was unveiled for the first time in the country as inviting 300 VIPs to the Yeongjongdo BMW Driving Center for 6 days from the 4^th to 9^th.

BMW Vision Future Luxury was introduced first time at the Beijing Auto Show this year and it was intended to be a concept car suggesting the direction of luxury sedan that BMW is pursing for a long time. It provides a whole new experience of luxury equipped with the qualities of intelligently lightened engineering, innovative interior design, and completely new user interface design.

Especially the L-shaped rear lights are applied with OLED lighting panel for the first time on a BMW which is much thinner and lighter than the existing LED and emits even light

SolMateS developed ITO deposition technology without damage

November 18, 2014/in Technology /by OLEDNET

The Dutch deposition equipment specialized company SolMateS unveiled the new OLED deposition process.

The newly developed deposition process by the SolMateS is a full transparent OLED called ‘soft-landing’ based on SolMateS’ pulsed laser deposition (PLD), which already obtained the patent. According to the SolMateS, the existing deposition technology like sputtering may cause damage to organic layers whereas the ‘soft-landing’ method enables to put an ITO thin layer on top of the OLED without damaging as it is proceeded in an even process temperature.

And recent test result shows not much difference in their functions between the OLED of 80% transparency and aluminum electrode OLED of no transparency. The ITO was deposited in the speed of sputter and PLD tool of 200mm is possible.

Arjen Janssens, the CEO of SolMateS mentioned that ‘PLD technology can be applied to various OLED applications using multiple transparency such as transparent lighting, display, smart window or top emitting OLED display, and it will be of great help for highly efficient organic solar cells.’

Established in 2006 in the Netherlands, the SolMateS is the deposition equipment supplier based on the laser deposition.

Source – SolMateS

reporter@olednet.co.kr

UDC, OLED market awaiting to bloom

November 14, 2014/in Market /by OLEDNET

On the 6^th, Universal Display Corporation (UDC), the U.S panel company, announced on their website that the 3Q/2014 Performance Summary was released on 30^th October.

The sales for the third quarter of 2014 is $32.9 million similar to $32.8 million which was the 3Q sales in the previous year. It is analyzed that the rise by a small margin is because the royalties and license fees were increased from $1.5 million in the third quarter of the last year to $5.4 million. In addition, another result includes the decrease of materials sales by 9% from $30.3 million to $27.5 million. It is considered that it fell due to the poor host materials sales. The business profit is $6.1 million, increased $1.9 million from the same period a year earlier.

The sales by the third quarter of 2014 is $134.9 million, increased by 39% as compared to the corresponding period last year. Though there is little demand for materials as the OLED industry is still in the preliminary stage, the UDC indicated on the report that there are variables to come. For that reason, the sales for this year is expected to be between $183 million and $185 million.

reporter@olednet.co.kr

Asus, Entering smart watch market with ZenWatch

November 14, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

The foreign media ‘Techcrunch’ reported that Asus will release OLED equipped ZenWatch as of 9^th November local time in the U.S at the price of $199.

According to the Japanese media on the 28^th of last month, the Asus ZenWatch as a Google Android Wear device was announced to be launched toward the end of November in Japan. It is said that the ZenWatch and ZenFone5 will be released at the end of this month and the discounted price of 5,000 yen will be applied when purchased simultaneously. But the price of ZenWatch is 32,184 yen which is about $90 differ from the U.S release price.

ZenWatch is equipped with 1.63-inch and 320×320 AMOLED touch display. The detailed specifications include the Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 and 1.2GHz CPU, 512MB RAM and Bluetooth 4.0 function, and the battery function of Polymer 1.4Wh.

Source – TechCrunch

reporter@olednet.co.kr

LGD, Plastic OLED Technology Announcement

November 13, 2014/in Technology /by OLEDNET

LG Display (LGD) is promoting actively as unveiling the plastic OLED technology applied to its own G Watch R.

It is published under the title ‘The New Advancement in Display technology: LG Display’s Plastic OLED’ on the LGD’s U.S Newsroom (http://lgdnewsroom.com/) and the contents are as follows.

The New Advancement in Display technology: LG Display’s Plastic OLED

What is Plastic OLED?

Plastic OLED is an OLED that is made out of plastic substrate. There are 4 very special key technologies applied to this OLED.

1) Plastic, not glass

LG Display has shattered the common belief that plastic cannot stand high temperatures, and developed plastic substrate (PI or polyimide) that remains stable under high temperatures and has chemical stability. Moreover, due to the development of the coating process of large format PI, it has become possible to manufacture PI film, which has enabled the plastic curving technology and the technology to eliminate unnecessary bubbles and foreign substances.

141110_LGD,POLED

2) LTPS(Low Temperature Poly Silicon) TFT(Thin Film Transistor) technology

One of POLED’s important features is that it can have thin bezel, since the fast electron mobility technology made the integration of different parts to be possible.

3) Flexible Encapsulation Technology to protect OLED elements

With the technology to manufacture inorganic film that prevents water and organic film that prevents alien substances, plastic OLED guarantees the stability of OLED elements.

4) Elimination of Carrier Glass using laser, and adhesionof Back Plate Film

The display surface is relatively clean and neat, as it prevents foreign substance from permeating the surface, by using Laser Source Uniformity technology, alien substance/crack prevention process technology, and flat-panel Back Plate Film and Film Lamination technology.

Why Plastic OLED?

1)Compared to currently existing displays, Plastic OLED has simpler structure. As it can be seen from the diagram below, LCD is composed of many layers of boards, while OLED’s structure is very simple.

2)While glass displays are prone to breakage, Plastic OLED, which is film based, is flexible to be curved to a certain angle, and it does not break easily.

3)Compared to LCD and glass OLED displays, Plastic OLED is thinner and lighter.

The future of Plastic OLED

As Plastic OLED can be applied to curved displays that are bent to a certain curvature, it can be used in various ways, including electronic goods, such as mobile phones, monitors, and TV, as well as cars, wearable devices, and items for interior design.

Other than its design, Plastic OLED is valuable in terms of portability and durability as well. Hence, it seems that Plastic OLED will play an important role in people’s everyday lives in the future.

The Plastic OLED’s potential is very promising. LG Display is devoting its energy and resources to respond quickly to fast growing market and consumers’ needs in order to develop Plastic OLED to become the key OLED application technology in the future.

Source – LG Display Newsroom

reporter@olednet.co.kr

Lenovo, impending release of Super AMOLED equipped smartphone

November 13, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

The technology specialized media Gizmobic announced the impending release of Super AMOLED equipped smartphone by Lenovo.

According to the article, the price was set at 1,999 yuan (about $330) for the Lenovo Sisley S90 which resembles the look of the recently launched Apple iPhone 6. It appears quite similar to iPhone 6 from every angle except the front and back. Even it stands out as the image used for this smartphone bears the likeness to the presentation of Apple iPhone 6.

Lenovo Sisley S90 is precisely analogous to the iPhone 6 with the thickness of 6.9 mm and the weight of 129g. However, unlike the iPhone 6 equipped with 4.7-inch retina LCD display, the Sisley S90 used 5-inch Super AMOLED. So it is possible to realize the display of 100% color gamut and the contrast ratio of 30,000:1.

In addition, it is furnished with 2GHz quad-core Snapdragon 410, Adreno 306 GPU, 1GB RAM, 16GB ROM, and the battery capacity of 2,300mAh.

Source – Gizmobic

reporter@olednet.co.kr

LG’s OLED TV, selected as ‘the best TV’ of the year

November 13, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

The OLED TV of LG Electronics was named as the ‘Best TV’ of the year.

The U.S based review media ‘Reviewed.com’ selected the LG’s 55EA9800 Curved OLED TV ($9,999) as the ‘Best of year’, announcing on their website. In the TV priced under $10,000 section, it received the highest point of 10.0 and also four of assessed OLED TVs scored the highest point as well.

Compared to the Samsung’s OLED TV KN55S9C, it was unable to improve the color production but it showed the color gamut of about 20% when using the displaying content. Furthermore, it was evaluated that the motion process was enhanced slightly.

LG’s OLED TV 55EA9800 was awarded the ‘Best Television of the Year’ and the ‘Best OLED TV of the Year’, and 55EA8800 earned the ‘Best Design of the Year’ by the Reviewed.com. And as the Smart TV+web OS obtains the ‘Best Smart TV Platform of the Year’, LG prepared a platform for the OLED era in the TV industry.

<LG’s OLED TV posted on the reviewed.com website – Source: Reviewed.com>

Source – Reviewed.com

reporter@olednet.co.kr

Dell Venue 8 7000, the emergence of the OLED equipped 6mm tablet PC

November 11, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

The Dell Venue 8 7000 Series is the thinnest tablet PC in the world that comes with the thickness of only 6mm. It has a display panel of 1600 x 2560, a pixel density of 359 ppi and the functions of the multi-touch and light sensor are built in this product.

The camera is 8M and 2M for the use of selfi mode with the system chip of Intel Atom and the processor of Quad core.

The OLED panel is expected to be the one that is produced by the Samsung Display as it has the same resolution with the panel employed for the tablet PC Galaxy Tab S SM-T700 that the Samsung Electronics has released.

Source: phone Arena.com

reporter@olednet.co.kr

LG Electronics, to open an era of OLED TV

November 11, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

As the sales of the LG Electronics 55-inch Curved OLED TV (Model: 55EC9300) exceeds over 1,000 units since it became available at the end of last September, it is leading the era of OLED TV popularization.

LG Electronics released the curved OLED TV at KRW 3.99 million which is 1/4 of the price of the product launched early last year at KRW 15 million. The sales amount has increased drastically more than 20 times as the price becomes affordable due to the improvement of panel yielding rate. According to the LG Electronics, the customers who used to hesitate to purchase the OLED TV because of the high price are coming back making increased inquiries.

And the favorable reviews from various media regarding the picture quality of the LG OLED TV are continued. The U.S. IT media Cnet said, “This product has the best picture quality ever conform to the expectations for the OLED” and touted “It is the greatest TV existing in the world that even the latest 4K LCD cannot surpass.”

The Reviewed.com also highly praised stating that “It is the product with the real infinite contrast range” and “It is the first TV offering such an excellent picture quality.”

The LG’s 55-inch Curved OLED TV realized the ultra slim thickness of 4.9mm as it does not need a backlight. Though it is a curved TV, there is little color distortion changing according to the viewing angle, providing more precise color and deeper picture quality than general LCD TV even in the various genres of viewing environments including drama, sports, movie, documentary, etc.

Huh Jae-chul, marketing director of LG Electronics, said that “The OLED TV is a completely different TV that presents realistic colors and the contrast range that no LCD TV can match” and “The increase of sales is the evidence that consumers’ experiences of the great picture quality are directly leading to the actual purchase.”

Source – LG electronics

reporter@olednet.co.kr

Solution Processing OLED Era is coming

November 11, 2014/in Technology /by OLEDNET

At the International Workshop on Flexible & Printable Electronics, IWFPE held in Jeonju, Konica-Minolta and DuPont presented diverse technologies that converts the OLED production process which requires a glass substrate into the technology of using a flexible substrate and printing technology.

Konica-Minolta is under development of the OLED panel for lighting and the production of a flexible OLED panel as a printing technology of R2R method for the first time in the world is imminent. Based on the camera film production technology, Konica-Minolta has a wide range of light-emitting materials technology and also the R2R technology at the same time, getting attention as a front-runner to open a new era of flexible electronics.

DuPont is the pioneer of the solution processed OLED display business as well. Equipped with the nozzle printing method which is its own printing technology, it continued to research and develop for many years with Samsung Display. The most critical benefit of the solution OLED is that it is the only technology to manufacture a large area OLED panel over 55-inch with RGB method at a large equipment bigger than the Gen8. DuPont completed the technological development of containment creation, ink deposition, and ink drying which are the essential technologies for the production of the solution OLED panel and is accelerating the commercialization. DuPont prospects that the solution OLED panel market will be open within three years at the latest.

reporter@olednet.co.kr

Development of the high efficiency solution processed fluorescent organic light-emitting device

November 11, 2014/in Technology /by OLEDNET

Korean researchers have developed the highly efficient florescent organic light-emitting device which enables to enhance the efficiency more than three times and is receiving much attention as the next generation display.

This research by the Prof. Jun Yeob Lee, the Ph.D. candidate/researcher Yong Joo Cho (the 1^st author) and the Prof. Kyoung Soo Yook from the Department of Polymer Science and Engineering at Dankook University was supported by the Mid-career Researcher Program funded by the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning and the National Research Foundation of Korea as well as the General Researcher Program funded by the Minister of Education and the National Research Foundation of Korea, and the research results were published on the Advanced Materials which is the international journal covering materials science on the 15^th October. (Paper Title: High Efficiency in a Solution-Processed Thermally Activated Delayed-Fluorescence Device Using a Delayed-Fluorescence Emitting Material with Improved Solubility)

Using the solution processing, it is expected to ease and simplify the process of producing the organic light-emitting device as the large area compared to the existing vacuum deposition plating.

However the problem is that when a device is produced through the solution processing using the existing fluorescent emitting material, the efficiency (external quantum efficiency) is only 5%. This is much less than the 20% which is the efficiency when produced by the vacuum deposition plating process.

The research team developed the high efficiency fluorescent organic light-emitting device, improved three times more than the previous fluorescent device for the solution processing. Compared to the existing structure, a solubility was increased by introducing the alkyl group as a substituent. Furthermore, the Donor-Acceptor Structure was employed to realize high efficiency by inducing delayed fluorescence phenomenon.

It is anticipated to advance the commercialization of a large scale organic light-emitting device for the enlargement of a future display.

The decrease of efficiency issue was resolved by making the surface film coating of a device smooth through the development of a new fluorescent light-emitting material which is soluble in organic solvents.

And introducing the strong Donor – Acceptor structure, it was possible to improve the efficiency as drawing delayed fluorescence phenomenon. The Donor – Acceptor structure refers to a monomer composed of an entity that donates electrons to another compound and that accepts electrons transferred from another compound.

Professor Lee revealed that “The following research will be continued to commercialize the solution processed fluorescent organic light-emitting device by developing a new material to improve not only the efficiency but also the lifespan of a device and a device structure appropriate for a solution processing.”

reporter@olednet.co.kr

[Analyst Column] Samsung Display, shooting for the future of display

November 11, 2014/in Analyst column /by OLEDNET

The DVCE (Display Valley Conference & Exhibition), supported by Samsung Display is held in every November in Asan, Chungcheongnam-do as one of the major events in the region which has established its position as a mecca of display industry. It is an international conference created by the active support from Samsung Display for the purpose of local development and industrial development of display business and it is the 10^th year of DVCE in 2014.

In the first day of DVCE on the 11^th, Hak-sun Kim, the vice president of Samsung Display gave a key note speech titled “Display Beyond Imagination”, suggesting the future directions for display through humanistic considerations.

Given that most of display related conferences or seminars are primarily of hardware or technology associated contents, this was the first occasion that the directions for the future display was proposed. Comparing the display with the history of art, Kim defined a new technology market to converge analog and digital. He mentioned the necessity to produce creative display by employing new functions in display as famous art masters have created innovative artworks by developing various techniques.

In particular, he has emphasized that it is critical to produce a human-friendly product as a human interface through fundamental understanding and reflection on the light and human eyes when developing a display. Kim proposed a vision for the future of the convergence product equipped with varied functions like lighting and eye, bio sensor, haptic sensor, etc. through the techniques employed by the artists like lighting and perspective, trompe I’oeil, texture, etc.

Kim expressed sincere regret for the decrease of display industry in Korea where new products are no longer produced, claiming the need for engineers who develop displays to converge and combine by means of humanistic consideration in order to promote display industry.

Yi Choong-hoon /Chief Analyst / UBI Research / ubiyi@ubiresearch.co.kr

Samsung, to actively respond to the low and middle priced smartphone market

November 5, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

Samsung Electronics announced the performance presentation for 3Q held on the 30^th of October. IM (mobile) division recorded KRW 24.580 trillion, a quarter-on-quarter decrease of 14% and the business profit was KRW 1.75 trillion, a quarter-on-quarter decrease of 60%.

The 3Q business profits of IM showed the largest drop compared to the previous quarter since 2012, and it was the first time falling under KRW 2 trillion. It is due to fierce growth of Chinese electronic companies and a month delayed announcement of Galaxy Note 4 than the previous model, having little influence on the performance of 3Q.

Robert Yi, chief of the firm’s investor relations team said, “We failed to quickly respond to the market flow of smartphones which is changing its focus towards price competition.” In view of that, Kim Hyun-joon, a senior executive at its mobile division, said “We will increase the profitability as actively response to the low and middle priced market” and the competitiveness will be reinforced as differentiating display and materials, and improving camera, AP system, etc.

141103_삼성, 스마트폰 중저가 시장 적극 대응

Samsung Electronics unveiled the Galaxy A series targeting the low and middle priced market, on the 31^st, only a day after unveiling the strategy regarding the low and middle priced market. With full metal body design, ‘Galaxy A5’ and ‘Galaxy A3’ are the slimmest Galaxy smartphones to the thickness of 6.7mm and 6.9mm respectively. Furthermore, Galaxy A5 and A3 is equipped with the 5-inch and 4.5-inch correspondingly, and front camera of diverse selfie functions and the very first five million pixels, targeting young consumers who are the most frequent selfie mode users. The price range is expected to be about 400 – 500 million won, and it will begin to release in November at the selected countries including China.

There is much attention towards whether Samsung Electronics will bring about good results with the full metal bodied Galaxy A series at the heart of China’s enormous price competitiveness.

reporter@olednet.co.kr

LG Electronics, Now it is the Age of OLED TV

October 21, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

LG Electronics presented a variety of products from TV to smartphone and smart watch at the Korea Electronics Show held from 14^th to 17^thOctober. The most prominent products among others were the OLED TV and newly released G Watch R. With five 77-inch UHD curved OLED TVs exhibited in panoramic array, the entry way attracted much attention from the visitors and at the exit, there was the G Watch R presented with the round display which represents the internal display of G Watch R. The LG Electronics’ view on the OLED was evidently demonstrated at the booth specifically designed the entrance and exit with OLED applied products.

One difference that the LG Electronics revealed at the Korea Electronics Show is no other than the attitude regarding the LG OLED TV.

Though numerous OLED TVs were exhibited at the IFA 2014, Germany in September, LG Electronics had somewhat passive approach as putting the phrase “The Future of TV” under every explanation of the OLED TV. However, after a month later at the Korea Electronics Show, the change was apparent toward more active way by arranging the large phrase of “Now, it is OLED age for TV” on the upper area of the booth with the 77-inch UHD curved OLED TVs.

There’s a lot to be done for LG Displays to expand the age of OLED TV. As LG Display marked on the photo above for itself, the curved UHD TV will be another task to be tackled. It is anticipated to see the LG Display’s next movement until the “The Age of OLED for TV” after crossing mountains on its way.

reporter@olednet.co.kr

[Analyst Column]For OLED Panel Late Starters, Securing High-Resolution Mask is Crucial

October 21, 2014/in Analyst column /by OLEDNET

The Chinese display companies like Visionox, Tianma, etc. are preparing the development and commercialization of OLED panel with BOE at the head. To keep up with the present leading company, Samsung Display, these second movers must be equipped with both product quality and reasonable price.

As the front runners of OLED panel, Samsung Display is maintaining the exclusive market for rigid type OLED which is made of a glass, and LG Display is producing the plastic (flexible) OLED panel using PI substrate for mobile devices.

The OLED panel is produced in QD resolution as a mobile device changes to adopt a high-resolution, but it is not a real resolution but uses a pentile method. For Samsung Display and LG Display are the two leading companies of the OLED industry, the supply chain is very firmly structured. So the relatively latecomers in this industry have difficulties in getting good materials and components from the suppliers who have intimate relationship with these two companies from the materials to equipment and components providers.

Furthermore, the established companies are managing and controlling the ecology of the industries to exclude the rival companies, preventing suppliers from providing products to the competing companies or late starters. Due to these strategies, the new comers are unable to secure sufficient resources for the development.

A typical component is a shadow mask which is critical for high-resolution. Known as a fine metal mask, this mask is an essential element to produce a high-resolution OLED of RGB structure and the shadow mask made of about a 40um thin plate to produce the high-resolution OLED which is more than 300 ppi but it is hard to find suppliers for the late comers.

BOE is seriously reviewing the matter of developing the OLED of WRGB structure to solve the shadow mask issue. The WRGB OLED does not require a fine metal mask as it uses the emitting materials in layers. The WRGB OLED creates the white light and realizes colors through the color filter.

Tianma is in the process of developing the slot type mask splitting the shadow mask.

<Tianma, divided mask slot type>

Yi Choong-hoon /Chief Analyst / UBI Research / ubiyi@ubiresearch.co.kr

Korean Display Companies, need urgent restructuring!

October 15, 2014/in Market /by OLEDNET

As the sales of Korean display companies drop drastically, the business profits are under the serious situations.

In 2012 when Samsung Display was established, the sales was about 33 trillion won and 29.8 trillion won in 2013, reduced by 10%. And it is expected to be about 24 trillion won, decreased about 20% compared to the previous year. LG Display is undergoing the similar situation where the sales was 29.4 trillion won in 2012 and 27 trillion won in 2013, losing the amount of 2.4 trillion won. The prospected sales for 2014 is about 25~26 trillion won.

Samsung Display’s business profits recorded 3.2 trillion won in 2012 and 3 trillion won in 2013, but the profit of 2014 is not anticipated as it is only 140 billion won in the second quarter of the year. Meanwhile, the business profits of LG Display were 0.9 trillion won in 2012 and 1.2 trillion won in 2013, expecting 1.4 trillion won in 2014.

While the sales and business profits of Samsung Display are slumping, the LG Display is improving its business value as the business profit increases slightly despite the sales decrease.

But these companies are facing inevitable sales decrease due to the intense investments and panel cost reductions of Chinese display companies, and increase of the production costs, worsening sales conditions of Korean display companies. Moreover, it is even harder to secure competitiveness as the technology level of Chinese panel companies are getting closer to that of Korean companies.

The problem is the decrease in the business profit. In reality, Samsung Display maintains the 33,000 employees since 2012. Given that the sales has decreased by 30% from 33 trillion won to 24 trillion won, keeping the same number of employees implies chronic structure of restricting the improvement of business profit. In purely arithmetical terms, Samsung Display requires structural adjustment of about 10,000 employees. The situation is unfavorable with LG Display as well. LG Display has about 55,000 employees which is 20,000 more than Samsung Display. LG Display’s business profit for this year might be greater than that of Samsung Display but it is relatively in bad circumstances considering sales per individual.

There still is no element likely to appear in 2015 to enhance the sales and business profits more than 2014. The sales fall is expected as the price is continually decreasing without any additional investment, and there is a high probability of business profit drop. However, there is a chance to increase the sales and business profits if these companies secure a market for the expensive OLED panel.

For display companies, the only way to achieve business profits without restructuring is lowering the supply prices of the parts, materials, and equipment. The OLED material industry which is blossoming now is struck by the mortal blow of 50% decrease of OLED emitting materials and relevant materials compared to 2012. The price decrease range of materials is excessively severe compared to the price decrease of the panel. Some companies are reconsidering the business and the poor performances of those display companies are shaking the forward and backward linkages of the industries higher than the actual numerical value.

To save the entire Korean display industries, Samsung Display and LG Display must secure the sound financial structure through structural adjustments rather than requesting of cost reduction for the supplier unilaterally.

The collapses of Japanese companies resulted from retaining the employments in spite of sales aggravation must be taken as a lesson.

reporter@olednet.co.kr

LG Chem., provide OLED lighting panel illuminate Tincan, the restaurant in London

October 15, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

LG Chem. continues its intense marketing activities for the OLED lighting. The OLED lighting panels were applied inside the Hanoak (traditional Korean house), remodeled with the IVAAIU City Planning last August, and the butterflied shaped lightings applying 240 OLED lighting panels were supplied to the caf? called Marley coffee in Itaewon. And the circular type OLED lighting panels were used to decorate Tincan, a newly opened pop-up restaurant in London in last September.

The OLED light used as the light source at Tincan was the Φ100 OLED Light panel (N6OA30) that the LG Chem. introduced early this year for the first time. The efficacy of the panel is 60lm/W, a high CRI is over 90, and the lifetime is 40,000 hours (LT70) at 3,000 cd/m², with only 1mm in thickness. The Lamp was designed by the architectural design firm AL_A using 3D printing.

LG Chem. is leading the OLED lighting panel business most actively as making the announcement last September for the release of the OLED lighting panel in November which will be equivalent to a LED lighting with the efficacy of 100lm/W and the lifetime of 40,000, and it has secured various lighting companies like Acuity and Zumtobel as a client.

< LG Chem.’s OLED lighting panel installed at Tincan>

reporter@olednet.co.kr

OLED TV, still the TV of the future?

October 3, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

Total eight companies announced the OLED TVs at the IFA 2014. The size ranged from 55-inch to 77-inch and six among those eight companies exhibited UHD resolution OLED TV.

What these eight companies are implying through exhibiting the OLED TV is that it is the Future TV. Revealing the three UHD OLED TVs using LG Display’s 65inch UHD panel, Panasonic set off that it is the Next-Generation TV Technology and the Chinese company Changhong presented 55-inch and 65-inch Curved OLED TVs in the Changhong @ Future Display zone.

For the First in World Innovation Technology Zone demonstrating the future of the company, Samsung showed OLED TV with the phrase ‘Curved OLED TV’, underlining the word ‘Curved’ not ‘OLED’ and this indicates the company’s focus in other direction,Curved LED TV.

As the leading company of the OLED TV market, LG outdid the OLED TV exhibition with total 11 products of OLED TV from FHD to UHD Curved, and variables in different sizes. But LG also shared that the OLED TV is ‘The Future of TV’. It is contrasted against that OLED TV took more than 50% of the entire booth at IFA 2014 and the active involvement implemented to take over the OLED TV market.

140912_OLED TV, 아직까지 미래의 TV인가

[Future TV, OLED TV in IFA2014]

Then what is the current TV for LG? Why the future of a TV should be the OLED TV? First of all, it is due to the pricewise. The LCD TV of the same size and resolution is sold for the half price and even the consumers recognize no distinctive differences for purchasing the LCD TV.

Majority of the companies exhibited the OLED TV have manufactured the product using panels provided by the LG Display which is in the course of making constant efforts to open a full-scale OLED TV market. And numerous companies in related business expect LG to open a market for OLED. It is anticipated to see how LG the different TV maker will form the OLED TV market in the future.

What is the optimal encapsulation technology for the Flexible AMOLED?

September 26, 2014/in Market, Technology /by OLEDNET

Currently mass-producing flexible AMOLED panels are taking PI substrate, backplane, and RGB deposition method, and the existing encapsulation technologies for A2 line of Samsung Display is TFE (thin film encapsulation) and hybrid encapsulation for LG Display.

But for the flexible AMOLED exclusive A3 line which is newly invested by the Samsung Display, advanced the orders not in the TFE but in the hybrid encapsulation method which is laminating the film after resin coating process on the passivation structure of inorganic layer and organic layer, similar to the method that the LG Display takes.

The reason for the change of encapsulation technology at the A3 of Samsung Display was analyzed in the “2014 Flexible OLED Report” issued by the UBI Research including the latest trends and issues such as the flexible AMOLED related issues and processes, market forecast of the flexible AMOLED panel and flexible OLED lighting, flexible AMOLED technologies comparison of Samsung Display and LG Display, etc.

According to this report, the flexible AMOLED panel market is forecasted to show a compound annual growth rate of about 60% through to 2020, reaching $ 17,600 million where the primary applications are expected to be for the flexible AMOLED panel of tablet pc.

<Flexible AMOLED panel Market Forecast>

reporter@olednet.co.kr

OLED for Smart Watch!

September 12, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

As Apple announces the Apple watch on the 9th (local time), the battle of a smart watch began for electronic companies including Samsung, LG, Apple, Sony, Motorola, and even ASUS. With the Samsung’s smart watch the Galaxy Gear, most of the products are released in the form similar to a square type display electric watch. In particular, when it comes to customer’s willingness to purchase a smart watch, the design is a critical element for it requires features for both electric device and fashion item at the same time.

Reflecting the comments that the design is rather crude, Samsung and LG adopted a new smart watch design. The Galaxy Gear of Samsung expanded the panel in 2-inch, acquiring visibility and adjusted to appropriately fit on a wrist. LG presented G Watch R with the round shape different from previous square types. The most recently unveiled Apple watch took the design of existing square form but highlighted a sense of softness as the surface curves toward the edges.

These all three products employed the flexible OLED which is thin and bendable, and enables different designs more than the glass type LCD as the cutting process is easily modifiable. Furthermore, the display qualities like the color resolution and power efficiency issues were already verified from the success of the Galaxy series which were equipped with the AMOLED panel.

The fact that Samsung, LG, and Apple chose to use the flexible OLED must be noted. From this detail, it is expected that there might be another trend in the OLED market as smart watches – though it is only three products for now- take the flexible OLED when the sales of AMOLED panel for mobiles are decreasing at present.

reporter@olednet.co.kr

[IFA2014] Future of LG is OLED

September 5, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

LG unveiled the smart watch LG G Watch R and 77-inch 4K OLED TV at the IFA.

Equipped with the 1.3-inch round display using the advantages of the plastic OLED, the LG G Watch R with the round plastic OLED (flexible OLED), distinguished itself from existing smart watches of a square screen resulting from the properties of display. Furthermore, its design approach has improved from the assumed notion of typical crude smart watch shape, presenting the all new circular display which is by no means inferior to conventional analog watches.

One of the critical issues regarding a smart watch is battery life. While an analog watch requires battery replacement once in a year or even 2-3 years, the smart watch needs to be charged at least once or twice a day minimum. So the screen turns off whenever it is not in use. LG enhanced the battery capacity from300mAh to 410mAh, emphasizing that it is a smart watch available all day by providing it with the Always On function that never turns off the screen to check time like an analog watch.

Unlike the Tizen, another smart watch for Galaxy Gear with AMOLED, it is installed with the Android Wear OS. With the voice control function of Google, it lets you search, message, and email.

The 4K OLED TV exhibited at the LG booth was total ten products with one 55-inch 4K, three 65-inch 4K, one variable 77-inch and six Curved OLED TV.

LG touted the OLED TV with three concepts titled Life like color, True black, and Self-lighting pixel. Providing lifelike and true to form experiences with videos magnifying the high contrast ratio, the 77inch 4K flexible OLED TV is the largest 4K OLED TV at present.

More than 50% of LG booth was comprised of the G watch S and OLED TV, demonstrating the scope of OLED business in the present and also the future of LG.

140905_LG의 미래는 OLED_2

reporter@olednet.co.kr

Galaxy Note 4 with thoughtful consideration to unveil worldwide

September 4, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

Samsung Unpacked Event Episode 2 was held in three countries of Belin, Beijing and New York simultaneously on September 3. With a high anticipation of the world, the Galaxy Note 4, Note Edge, the Gear S, and Gear VR were revealed.

Compared to the Galaxy Note 3, the Galaxy Note 4 has improved in its resolution, S Pen function, and camera and battery performances. The resolution has been enhanced from FHD to QHD and the resulting increase of battery power consumption issue was resolved through the advancement of battery performance and power consumption. Though there were not much to pay attention in terms of specifications, what stood out was the sense of careful consideration of users in the Galaxy Note 4’s.

One among those is the battery charging time. Most of the people spend a substantial amount of time using smartphones in daily life. Therefore, the battery charging time is as important as the battery capacity. And the Galaxy Note 4 has decreased the time for charging 50% from 55 to 30 minutes.

Another improvement was a camera software which is the most frequently used function of a smartphone. Assuming that the use of front camera is as common as the back one, the self-camera function was upgraded, featuring 3.7 megapixel resolution, the maximum aperture of F1.9 allowing vivid photographing, 120 degree self-camera function and a function of taking pictures by tapping the HR Sensor.

Samsung has been announced the Galaxy related accessories from the Galaxy S5. For this time with the Galaxy Note 4, the luxurious image was emphasized by releasing products like battery covers created in collaboration with the high-end brands such as Swalovski and Monblac.

One more product is the Galaxy Note Edge, characterized with a display that curves over right side enabling the information check not only on the front display but also on the side screen. It is possible to see push notifications and launch applications even when the smartphone cover is closed. In addition, the entire front display can be used as a photographing screen and the side screen removes any distraction from any notifications while surfing the internet or watching videos.

Galaxy Note 4 will be on sale worldwide sequentially starting this October.

The future market response is expected to see how the Samsung’s meticulous concern for users presented in the Galaxy Note 4 will be delivered to the customers.

reporter@olednet.co.kr

OLED TV cost saving, the alternative is co-planar structure

September 4, 2014/in Technology /by OLEDNET

Current AMOLED panel market is mainly led by either Samsung Display or LG Display, mass producing the LTPS backplane for mobiles and Oxide backplane for TVs.

Though the AMOLED panel market for mobiles has established stable position in the business beyond LCD panel market, the market for TV is having difficulties in settling for its high price compared to the LCD/LED TV, requiring pressing technological development to lower the cost.

As a counterplan for this, the LG Display received a considerable attention at the SID 2014 by exhibiting 65-inch curved UHD OLED TV applying not the existing etch stopper layer (ESL) structure but the co-planar structure.

According to the “2014 AMOLED Backplane Technical Report” published by the UBI Research, it was analyzed that there is a difference in the investment expenses by about $ 80 million when making the additional investment in oxide TFT AMOLED line of co-planar for a-Si LCD line against the supplementary investment in oxide TFT AMOLED for LCD line. (For Gen 8) It was also suggested that the co-planar structure is appropriate for the oxide TFT structure which can make the best use of the backplane and color filter equipment of the previous a-Si LCD line as the mask can be used under 6 layers.

In addition, the core issue of the AMOLED industry which is a technological concern over the flexible LTPS applied to the flexible display was examined along with the latest technology trend analysis of LTPS, oxide, and organic TFT in the “2014 AMOLED Backplane Technical Report”.

reporter@olednet.co.kr

LG Electronics to release the world’s first ‘Ultra OLED TV’

August 26, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

LG Electronics unveiled the Ultra OLED TV on August 25 at the Conrad Hotel in Yoido where Ha Hyun-hwoi, president of Home Entertainment (HE) and Choi Sang-gyu, head of Korea sales and marketing at LG Electronics were in attendance.

□ President Ha Hyun-hwoi announced a shift in generation

“The Ultra OLED TV is an epitome of TV technology combining the best display and resolution,” the president Ha Hyun-Hwoi said, adding that “The future OLED TV market will be expanded, leading the display technologies.” Regarding the curved surface of OLED competitive with LCD, he explained “The priority is given to the resolution of a TV” and “There is no distortion of color or change of picture quality in the curved surface of the OLED TV”. Saying that “OLED TV will play a role of a game changer replacing the LCD within 2-3 years with various merits like color reproduction rate, contrast range, viewing angle, etc.” he also emphasized “The next generation of TV market trend will led by the state-of-the-art premium Ultra OLED TV in existence”.

□ Concentration of hardware competitiveness and platform capacity of LG

The LG Ultra OLED TV provides the most lifelike graphic picture quality with ultra HD resolution of its unique WRGB technology and 33 million sub-pixels. For the characteristics of the self-lighting pixels, the indefinite contrast rate is allowed, reproducing perfect black color. With rapid response speed, it also reproduces natural image without any afterimages. This product is also equipped with a sound quality which is appropriate for the flawless picture quality. Designed with the world-renowned professional audio company Harman, it delivers balanced wide-range sound quality of exhilarating effects with multi-channel ultra surround technology. In addition, the sense of immersion and the aesthetic effect were maximized for the innovative design approaches of ultra slim curved screen and leaf-shaped stand. Due to its own attribute, there is no distortion or change of color in OLED TV watching from every direction. It can be installed on the wall depending on the surrounding environment and preferences. Loaded with innovative web OS, this product offers significant values more than the existing smart TV. The web-based smart TV is recognized as a new strong point of TV platform of reorganizing the smart TV market by the ‘simple usability’ through ▲simple transition ▲simple search ▲simple connection which is the essence of a TV.

□ Establishment of next generation TV market pioneering base

LG Electronics plans to lead the next generation TV market by securing medium-and long-term growth momentum through OLED TV. And through the continuous innovation in manufacturing technology, R&D, and investment on marketing, the OLED TV era is to be advanced and the OLED TV will be the new growth engine for display industries through the expansion of ecosystem. Established the OLED TV manufacturing line in major cities over the world from the last year, LG Electronics will release the Ultra OLED TV at the beginning next month in North America, Europe, etc. sequentially.

□ Presales to begin on 26^th at LG Electronics distributors nationwide

LG Electronics will take pre-orders for 65-inch Ultra OLED TV (Model: 65EC9700) from the 26^th to 29^th of next month at the LG Electronics distributors nationwide. The 65-inch Ultra OLED TV will be sold at a price of 12,000,000 won through the cashback benefit. The delivery starts from the end of September. And LG will consolidate the lineup of the Ultra OLED TV as releasing 77-inch (Model: 77EG9700) model in the fourth quarter.

reporter@olednet.co.kr

Samsung Electronics Released the ‘Galaxy Alpha’ Smartphone Equipped with Metal Frame

August 18, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

The premium smartphone ‘Galaxy Alpha’ released on 13^th of this month is the first to feature the specialized design approach with a metal frame.

According to the Samsung’s own website, the ‘Galaxy Alpha’ unveiled its new design approach applying metal frame material for solid finish.

The grip is emphasized measuring at just 6.7mm thick and the weight of 115g, and it comes with 4.7-inch HD super AMOLED (1280X720) display.

Samsung says that the Galaxy Alpha takes the Exynos 5430 and the model number is Exynos Modem 303 which is the Application Processor (AP) that Samsung developed independently with the world’s first 20nm manufacturing process and as a result the power consumption reduces to 25% compared to its predecessor based on a 28 nm process.

Also, the Galaxy Alpha has connectivity with the Samsung wearables such as Gear 2, Gear Fit, etc. and includes the latest features like ultra-power saving mode, finger print scanner, S-health, etc.

“Samsung always tries to provide consumers with a new product that they want,” said JK Shin, CEO and Head of IT & Mobile Communication at Samsung Electronics, and added “The Galaxy Alpha is a distinguishing device of combining beautiful and functional design with a unique user experience of Galaxy smartphone.”

The Galaxy Alpha will be available at the beginning of September in over 150 countries sequentially.

reporter@olednet.co.kr

AMOLED manufacturing equipment market, expected to be about 36 trillion won from 2015 to 2020

August 12, 2014/in Market /by OLEDNET

According to an equipment report, “2014 AMOLED manufacturing Equipment Technology Analysis and Market Forecast (2015~2020),” published by a market research firm, UBI Research, the AMOLED manufacturing equipment market size will be about 36 trillion won from 2015 to 2020. Stepper appears to be the largest sector in the equipment market by forming about 10 trillion won and taking up about 30 % of market share. Evaporator will take 17% with about 6 trillion.

It is forecasted that Chinese makers will start to invest in AMOLED business. Predicted market size is about 6 trillion won in 2015. In 2017, full-scale investment on the AMOLED panel line for TV will be started. About 9.5 trillion won market will be formed and become the largest market size by 2018.

From 2015 to 2020, the market share of backplane manufacturing, encapsulation and OLED manufacturing equipment will be 69%, 17% and 14%, respectively, in the overall AMOLED equipment market.

In the overall AMOLED equipment market by country, Korean market size is expected to grow to about 20 trillion won taking up 55% market share for six years and it is analyzed that Korea will continuously lead the AMOLED industry.

<2015~2020, AMOLED manufacturing equipment market>

reporter@olednet.co.kr

KITECH, Developed the world’s first refining technology for organic light-emitting material using ILs for OLED TV

July 28, 2014/in Technology /by OLEDNET

Dr. Taewon Kim’s team of photovoltaic energy convergence research group of Korean Institute of Industrial Technology (KITECH, President Yong-Soo Lee) developed an original technology to refine organic light-emitting materials in bulk for fine OLED TV at low price.

Dr. Kim’s team established a new concept for the refining technology by using Ionic Liquids (ILs), and it can solve issues of high cost·low yield rate arisen in production of the organic light-emitting material for the OLED TV.

Ionic Liquids are liquids that only consist of positive and negative ions at room temperature and stays in liquid form at high vacuum (~100℃) with almost no volatility. Recently, ILs became a future clean solvent in green chemistry field with a strength of good solubility for high molecular substance and a feature of metal salts.

Until now, ‘sublimation refining method’ has been used to get high purify organic light-emitting material by utilizing the difference of sublimation points between vaporization and solidification of a material. However, cons of this method are low yield rate and very high production cost because it is impossible to realize complete auto and continuous process.

To address this issue, Dr. Kim’s team started developing the large scale refining technology for the organic light-emitting materials at low cost since 2011 and applied for original patent in December, 2012. Their effort on verifying the possibility of the technology’s application produced this result in 19 months.

The key of the result is the application of the high purity refining technology on the organic light-emitting material for the OLED TV by focusing on the non-volatile feature of ILs at high vacuum·high temperature.

This technology uses a principle of separating impurities in the order of vaporizing the organic light-emitting material in a vacuum chamber; dissolving it in a liquid filter of ionic liquid; and recrystallizing supersaturated material in the liquid. It enables to get 99.95% of high purity organic light-emitting material through one refining process.

It is a completely new concept of large scale refining method based on the non-volatility characteristic of ionic liquid at high vacuum·high temperature.

The team is credited with the success of new technology development which can overcome the cons of the existing sublimation refining method including refinery yield rate, automation and continuous process of equipment, and efficiency of mass production. It is also expected to bring a huge cost reduction effect by recycling; collect and reprocess during refinery process, of the expensive but non-volatile ionic liquid.

According to “2014 OLED Emitting Material Annual Report Market Forecast (~2020)” by a professional OLED market research firm, UBI Research, the OLED emitting material market is expected to grow to 1.3 trillion won in 2017 from 2014 estimation of 543 billion won. Forecasted annual growth rate is over 30% and experts see that the growth will be much larger if large size display market including the AMOLED TV expends in full-scale.

Dr. Taewon Kim, said, “this technology increased the yield rate and decreased the production cost by more than 50%. And an ultimate goal is to reduce the current price by one tenth” and “technology development is in progress with companies.” He also said, “the success is a game changer with enormous potential to turn the OLED TV market-to-explosively grow” and “based on the low-cost and large scale refining original technology, domestic businesses will largely contribute to preoccupy the global market of forward-backward industry regarding the OLED TV.”

The team currently applied 16 cases for patent with related process․equipment technology in and out of the country and plans active technology transfer to related businesses.

<Comparison of refining methods for organic light emitting materials Source: KITECH>

Launching of Gionee’s ultra-thin AMOLED smart phone (5mm) is imminent

July 23, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

Ctimes, a Chinese medium, reported that a Chinese smart phone maker, Gionee, will introduce an ultra-thin smart phone modeled GN9005.

GN9005 used AMOLED panel and is 0.55mm thinner than 5.55mm of the previous model, which was introduced as Elife S5.5 last February.

It is noticeable that 4.8” HD AMOLED panel is applied which is smaller than the 5” FHD Super AMOLED applied to the previous Elife S5.5. In general, the AMOLED panels produced by Samsung Display are named super AMOLED. However, no particular name for the AMOLED panel applied to GN9005 and its low performance indicate that the panel is highly likely to be supplied by AUO.

It is known that AUO has started supply to a Chinese maker from last June but any specifics on the maker has not been revealed.

A Chinese smart phone maker, BBK, drew attention with 5.75mm VIVO X3 after the launch of 6.18mm Ascend P6 by Huawei last year. Followed by launching, Gionee introduced the 5.55mm Elife S5.5 in February and will launch 5mm GN9005 and that fierce competition will begin soon in the ultra-thin smartphone market in China.

<Gionee’s ultra-thin smart phone comparison>

<Gionee’s the world’s thinnest smartphone, ‘5mm’ GN9005, Source : TENAA>

Taiwan grows OLED lighting industry

July 22, 2014/in Others /by OLEDNET

According to CTIMES, a Taiwanese professional electronics industry medium, the OLED Lighting Commercialization Alliance (OLCA) was recently established for the development of the OLED lighting industry in Taiwan. Founding members of the OLCA are the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) and Taiwan Lighting Fixture Export Association (TLFEA), and various companies from materials to manufacturing are members of the OLCA. It is consisted of five committees such as lamps, lighting design, materials, fixtures and optical engines.

Chairman of TLFEA, Steve Lin said, “the OLED is ideal for proximity lightings and it is already installed in luxury apartment in Taiwan. Due to the expensive price of the OLED compare to the LED, it is not in mass-production, but it will become a standard lighting in all households within 3 years.” Vice President of ITRI, C.T.Liu, also forecasted the OLED playing an important role in IoT (Internet of Thing) sector and emphasized that Taiwan will be the center of the OLED lighting industry.

“2014 OLED lighting Annual Report” by UBI research forecasted that the OLED lighting market will be about US M$ 4,700 by 2020.

Sony unveils Head Mounted Display (HMD) for medical care

July 17, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

Sony displayed a system, which enables you to check endoscope video through Head Mounted Display (HMD) at International Modern Hospital Show 2014 held from July 16^th to 18^th, 2014. For the existing endoscopy surgery, posture restriction exists because the procedure requires external monitoring. With Sony’s new product, surgery, however, can be performed without the posture restriction.

This specialized product for medical purpose weights only about 490g which enables an operator to perform in a standing position. It doesn’t fully cover eyes of an operator by changing the shape of wearable belt so that the operator can visually check surgery device by lowering the eyes without taking it off.

This medical HMD is installed with Sony’s OLED display and shows images on the OLED display individually thus crosstalk is not that large and doesn’t induce dizziness during its use.

Sony consulted with doctors to develop this system and said that demand for this competitive system will increase as 3D endoscope increases.

<Sony’s Head Mounted Display(left), Picture of wearing HMD(right), Source : Monoist>

UBI Research, Hosting International OLED Workshop

July 13, 2014/in Others /by OLEDNET

An event will be held to exchange information with experts from the world on OLED, which suggests new solutions lighting market and brings positive changes to a staggering display market with introduction of a flexible smartphone and a curved TV.

On 12^th, UBI Research, a market research and consulting firm specialized in the OLED, announced that it will host ‘the 2^nd Annual Korea OLED Workshop’ at COEX conference room in Samsung-dong on June 24^th.

It is known that the world’s top OLED experts have been invited to cover information valuable to the industry to the upcoming event. Also, commercialization of flexible display, technological roadmap of WRGB OLED TV, and opportunities and challenges of the OLED display and lighting technology will be addressed. Especially technology and opportunity of Chinese OLED display will be covered.

An official of UBI Research said, “this workshop will be a place to check the roles and competitiveness of Korean, Chinese, Japanese and Tawnies companies in the next OLED lighting and flexible areas.”

For more information on the OLED Workshop, where researchers and executives of the OLED industry participate from around the world, refer to www.oldenet.co.kr and www.ubiresearch.co.kr or contact +82-2-577-4391.

Oculus Rift’s DK2 shipment just begins

July 11, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

Oculus, an American VR business, began shipment of the 2^nd generation product, DK2.

According to OLED info, pre-order of DK2, the 2G product of Oculus, began in March, 2013 and 45,000 units were ordered by June, 2014. Ten thousand out of 45,000 units has been shipped on July 1^st and the remaining will be shipped in the middle of August.

Oculus used LCD display for the first prototype but OLED display was used for the new product on the market. A video clip uploaded on Oculus’ homepage (http://www.oculusvr.com/) explicitly shows why Oculus used the OLED rather the LCD for faster response speed. Also replacing the LCD with the OLED greatly reduced motion sickness due to 3D while adding a positional tracking feature by mapping you movements with a camera and infrared light.

Merger between COMEDD and Fraunhofer FEP

July 8, 2014/in Others /by OLEDNET

Fraunhofer FEP announced its merger with COMEDD, a research institute of Fraunhofer on July 5^th.

The beginning of COMEDD was a research agency of Fraunhofer IPMS focusing on organic materials and electronic devices. It became an independent research institute of Fraunhofer in July, 2012. It is known that the merger with Fraunhofer FEP is to gain competitiveness for OLED by naming itself as COMEDD FEP.

Director of COMEDD FEP, Prof. Volker Kirchhoff, is hopping that the merger will contribute to development of barrier film for flexible organic components and the OLED based micro-display sector. It will focus on developing large area flexible sheet and the OLED lighting sheet by combining electron beam tech. and plasma tech. of Fraunhofer FEP and organic semiconductors tech. of COMEDD.

LG Electronics’ 77” Curved OLED TV for￡20,000

July 4, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

LG Electronics’ 77” UHD curved OLED TV displayed at CES 2014 attracted attention of many foreign visitors. According to a Chinese medium, Shanghai Hotline, LG Electronics (LGE) officially launched the 77” UHD curved OLED TV, for ￡20,000 (about 34.6 million Kwon) in the British market. Official from LGE says, however, we are just planning to sales 77” UHD curved OLED TV.

With 4K UHD resolution (3840×2160), the 77” OLED TV offers a high picture quality, providing close to nature images, and comfortable viewing experience. Its unique design of curved screen and ellipse shape stand also allows you to enjoy high-contrast colorful pictures from any angle. This 77” UHD OLED TV won ‘Best of Innovations” award at CES 2014, and moves 7.5cm to bend so it moves 8cm to bend from flat and its angle is also adjustable.

LGE plans to launch 65” UHD curved OLED TV for ￡6,000 (about 10.3 million Kwon) with the same features as the 77” TV in this October.

<LG Electronics’ 77” UHD flexible OLED TV at CES 2014>

Samsung, introducing ‘Galaxy S5 mini’ targeting the world market

July 3, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

Samsung Electronics announced Galaxy S5 mini, a new Galaxy series. Its design is similar to the previous model but not the specifications.

Compare it with the previous model, its panel is a 4.5” HD AMOLED which is smaller than the 5.1” FHD AMOLED panel, and lighter by about 25g weighting 120g. Main specifications include quad core 1.4GHz CPU, LTE, 1.5GB memory, 16GB storage, Android 4.4 and 8 mega pixel camera. Galaxy S5 mini has features are waterproof, dustproof, finger scanner and ultra-power saving mode like Galaxy S5.

The galaxy S5 mini colored as the Galaxy S5 is planned to hit the global market after launching it in Russian market in early July.

Samsung Electronics has been continuously introducing new models from the Galaxy S3 to S5 including an entry-level model, mini.

<Galaxy S5 mini, similar design to Galaxy S5>

<Comparison of Galaxy mini series>

Imminent release of the world’s first hybrid smart watch, TalkBand, in UK

June 18, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

TalkBand, a band type wearable device released by Hauwei at MWC 2014 in the last February, is introduced on Amazon, a large online retailer.

One of the TalkBand’s strength is that it can be transformed into a Bluetooth earphone and that gave a title of the world’s first hybrid smart watch to the TalkBand. 1.4” Curved PMOLED by Futaba is applied to the TalkBand. It is expected to draw more customers’ attention by adding a health care feature (tracking calorie intake, sleep pattern and fitness).

According to Amazon UK, TalkBand will be available on June 30^th for $99.9 (about 173,000 WON).

<Hauwei’s TalkBand, MWC 2014>

DOE, Announcing New OLED lighting Project

June 18, 2014/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced its selection of nine (9) solid-state lighting (SSL) R&D projects. Four out nine projects are related to OLED lighting and selected companies/universities to run the projects are OLED Works, Pixelligent Technologies, Princeton University, and University of California. The project funding will be over $13.7 million (DOE funding, $10.5 million) and funding for each project was not revealed. It is expected that these one-to two-year projects will accelerate cost reduction of SSL technology and improvement of quality and performance.

Details of the OLED lighting projects are as follows.

<DOE’s New OLED lighting Projects, Source : DOE>

‘Galaxy Tap S’ is finally unveiled. Targeting the market with differentiated AMOLED picture quality

June 16, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

<Galaxy tab S, source ; Samsung Elec.>

Samsung Electronics (SSE) unveiled ‘Galaxy Tap S,’ which is the strategic premium tablet PC of SSE, at an event of ‘Galaxy Premiere 2014’ held in New York, U.S.A on 12^th. Excellent color sensitivity of the ‘Galaxy Tap S’ panel was emphasized on the previously introduced teaser trailer with a copy of ‘Tab/Tap Into Color’ by applying AMOLED panel. Good color reproduction, high contrast and fast response speed as well as differentiated picture quality from the existing LCD panel are the strengths to be used to target the market.

The Galaxy Tap S is available in 6.6mm thick two models; 8.4” and 10.5” with WQXGA 2560×1600. It is expected that M6 material upgraded from materials used in the previous Galaxy models will be used.

Estimated price for the Galaxy Tap S is about 400,000 to 500,000 KWON and it will be officially released in July.

Apple’s iWatch with flexible AMOLED will be on the market in October

June 13, 2014/in Set /by OLEDNET

Apple Inc. plans to release a new product, Smart Watch (iWatch) in October. According to Nihon Geizai Shimnun, iOS 8 combined iWatch will be on the market in this October and 3 to 5 million iWatches will be produced monthly. An IT specialized media, recode.net, also reported that ‘tentatively, Apple Inc. will host a special event in October and unveil a wearable device.’

Specifications of Apple’s iWatch are unknown though 1.3~1.5” flexible OLED display is expected to be used. It is forecasted that LG Display will supply the flexible AMOLED panel for the iWatch and mass-produce about 2 million displays from this July to September.

As Mark Parker, the formal CEO of Nike once mentioned that ‘Apple Inc. and Nike will jointly introduce a wearable product,’ the focus of the iWatch will be on health and a partnership between Nike and Apple Inc. is expected.

As of now, it is known that Apple Inc. is testing each of 1.4”, 1.5” and 1.6” models. As prediction says, the iWatch will be available in different sizes by gender; males and females and be about $300.

<Apple’s product launch schedule forecast in 2014, Source : Know Your Mobile>

<Concept and functions of iWatch, Source : Know Your Mobile>

OLED lighting, replacing LED is in the not too distant future

June 11, 2014/in Lighting /by OLEDNET

At SID2014, it was proved that OLED lighting has competitiveness in terms of efficiency and can compete with LED for the general lighting.

Konica Minolta developed 131lm/W OLED lighting panel last March. It also released an OLED lighting panel with efficacy of 139lm/W at the SID 2014 and drew more attention. Panasonic also presented on OLED, and drew more attention unveiling a prototype in Author interview.

Considering that the efficacy of currently commercialized LED lighting is about 80~130lm/W, it is analyzed that the fruitful result at the SID 2014 showed the potential of the OLED lighting becoming the general lighting instead of the LED lighting.

The most concerned issues of the OLED lighting are lifetime and cost. For the general lighting, 40,000hr, which the OLED panel makers target, is estimated enough considering replace period of the lighting, but the issue is the cost. Compared to the LED, the OLED lighting is expensive and currently forms a high-end lighting market. However, it is inevitable to down the cost for entering the general lighting market. Although LG Chem. announced a price reduction to 200$/Klm from 600$/Klm, investment of the OLED lighting makers in mass-production is vital to reform the general lighting market with the OLED lighting.

The OLED lighting panel has reached the level equal to the LED lighting. Now is the time that the OLED lighting panel companies make a turning point and can leap again by investing as they did with display.

did with display.

<Performance report of Konica Minolta’s 139lm/W OLED lighting panel, SID2014>

<Panasonic’s 133 lm/W OLED lighting panel, SID2014>

후지 필름(Fujifilm), UDC에 OLED 특허 매각

July 26, 2012/in Component, Focus on /by oled

후지 필름은 Universal Display(UDC)에 OLED 관련 특허 약 1200건과 application을 1억 5백만달러(약 1200억원)에 매각한다고 발표했다.

후지 필름은 10년이상 OLED 관련 개발을 진행해왔으며, OLED 개발을 위한 UDC와 전략적 협약을 위해 OLED 관련 특허 매각을 결정했다고 전했다. 후지필름은 UDC의 공급사를 중심으로 전세계 OLED 제작사에 barrier 필름, 전도성 필름, flexible 기판과 같은 재료의 공급을 늘려갈 예정이다.

Souce: 후지필름, UDC

reporter@olednet.co.kr

코니카미놀타 OLED 제작 가능한 잉크젯 헤드 개발

February 29, 2012/in Component, Focus on /by oled

Konica Minolta IJ Technologies, Inc.(코니카미놀타)는 1 피코리터 드롭 사이즈가 인쇄가능한 OLED 제작가능한 잉크젯 헤드”KM128SNG-MB”를 개발했다고 발표했다.
잉크젯프린트헤드 “KM128SNG-MB”는 코니카미놀타의 실리콘 MEMS 기술을 이용해 제작한 첫 제품이며, 올해 봄부터 판매를 시작할 것으로 예상된다.

코니카미놀타의 KM128SNG-MB

새로 개발된 잉크젯헤드 KM128SNG-MB는 반도체 공정 기술을 사용한 실리콘 MEMS 기술을 이용해 제작한 차세대 잉크젯 프린트헤드이다. MEMS 기술을 통해 코니카 미놀타는 마이크로 드롭 사이즈의 배출이 가능한 고정밀 프린트 헤드 구조(인쇄폭38mm, 128노즐) 개발에 성공했다. 잉크 흐름 통로 디자인과 고 정밀 조립 공정에 관한 자사 고유기술은 매우 작은 드롭사이즈의 (레이아웃)을 달성했다. 또한 새로운 잉크젯 헤드는 산업용 기기용의 다양한 잉크에 내구성이 높으며, 낮은 점도의 잉크 사용에도 적합하다. MEMS 기술을 이용함으로써 노즐을 통합할 수 있었으며, 이는 컴팩트 잉크젯 프린트헤드를 제작할 수 있게 했다. 새로이 개발된 잉크젯 프린트헤드는 OLED 디스플레이 패터닝, OLED 조명 thin layer 코팅, 스마트폰과 같은 정확도가 요구되는 디스플레이 제조 기술에 이용될 것으로 기대된다.

차세대 플렉서블 디스플레이를 포함한 인쇄전자 시장은 2020년 약 2조엔 가량까지 성장할 것으로 예상되며(Konica Minolta 연구결과), 이 신제품이 인쇄전자 시장에 사용될 것으로 기대된다. 코니카 미놀타는 2011년 설립된 Japan Advanced Printed Electronics Technology Research Association (JAPERA)의 창립 멤버이다. 이 혁신적인 잉크젯 기술을 이용해 코니카 미놀타는 차세대 인쇄 전자 기술의 연구 개발해 기여하고 있다.

주요 특징

– 반도체 공정에 사용되는 실리콘 MEMS 기술 이용

– 1 피코리터 drop 사이즈의 인쇄 전자 기기를 위한 첫 번째 프린트헤드

– 고정밀 프린트 헤드 구조 : 38mm 인쇄폭, 한 줄에 128개의 노즐 설치

– 한 개의 노즐 단위로 정확도 드라이브 컨트롤

– 산업기기용 낮은 점도의 잉크 최적화와 높은 잉크 저항성

– 100nm 수준의 균일한 박막 코팅

– OLED 디스플레이와 같은 디스플레이 제조 기술용으로 사용가능

세부사항

주요 Application

OLED 디스플레이 패터닝, OLED 조명 박막 코닝, 고 정밀함을 요하는 새로운 제조기술, 스마트폰과 같은 고부가가치의 디스플레이.
[코니카미놀타 홈페이지]

reporter@olednet.co.kr