OLED news roundup: May 2012

OLED-Info - 18 May 2012

OLED-Info shares the latest news from the monthly OLED-Info newsletter.

L+B: OLED lighting news

The Light+Building 2012 exhibition opened on April 15, and this year several companies unveiled interesting and exciting new OLED installations and panels. First up was Philips, which unveiled a new OLED panel, the Lumiblade GL350. GL stands for General Lighting and Philips say that this is the first panel to break the 'functional lighting' barrier, with its high brightness of 115 lumens. The GL350 is not very efficient though - only 16.7 lm/W. Philips also unveiled a couple of beautiful OLED installations and a new spiral lamp.

Osram unveiled a new OLED panel - the second generation Orbeos (or the SDW-058). The new panel (which is built in the new pilot production line in Regensburg) is more efficient at 40 lm/W (up from around 25 lm/W), and it's also larger (119 x 119mm). Osram also unveiled a new connector system for OLED panels and a large installation with 1,000 Orbeos panels.

Novaled also unveiled some new OLED lamps, including the PAD which uses three transparent white OLED panels. Interestingly, when the panels are turned off, each will filter the ambient light to be in a different color. Tridonic also revealed six lamps that uses their OLED modules, including a new Kinetic luminaire. The Fraunhofer IPMS demonstrated several new lamps including ones that use their transparent TABOLA panels.

AUO's LED maker subsidiary Lextar unveiled new portable OLED lighting panels. The panels are powered from built-in lithium-ion batteries and has a magnet on the pack so it can attach to metallic objects. The panels are 3.7 mm thick and include a three-section dimmer.AUO first announced its entry into the OLED lighting market in November 2010, but we haven't heard any news since. It's good to see them getting ready to actually produce panels.

Hands on with Fraunhofer's transparent OLEDs

The Fraunhofer Institute first announced its Tabola OLED lighting panels back in October 2010, with plans to release them in Q1 2011. After some delays, they are finally shipping samples to customers (although they have no plans to make these into mass-produced products). It is offering regular, structured and transparent panels - which makes these the first transparent OLED lighting panels on the market. Read on for our hands-on review, complete several videos and comparisons to other OLED lighting panels on the market.

Sony to outsource OLED television panels?

There are reports that Sony decided to buy OLED television panels to use in its own Bravia OLED televisions. There are several such reports, suggesting that Sony is in talks with Samsung, LG Display and AUO. Sony itself declined to comment, and the new CEO said earlier that it will develop its own OLED technology.

There are further reports that Sony is collaborating with AUO on OLED technology and production. These reports say that Sony will buy all of AUO's AMOLED production capacity in the near-term. Sony will use AUO's 4.3-inch AMOLED panels in upcoming mobile phones. This contradicts earlier reports that HTC secured AUO's entire capacity.

Visionox OLED lighting programme updates

We've got some interesting updates about Visionox's OLED lighting programme. The company has started to produce new OLED lighting panels. Those panels are 73 x 42mm in size (active area 30 x 60mm), and are 1.8mm thick. The lifetime is over 10,000 hours (LT70) at 1000 cd/m², and the colour temperature is 4,500K-5,000K. The panels are actually quite cheap at $70.

Visionox also unveiled its next-generation panels, currently being produced in small quantities on a pilot line. The new panels are 80 x 80mm in size (active area 64 x 64mm) and feature a colour temperature of 4,500K, over 80 CRI and a lifetime of over 10,000 hours (LT50 at 2000 cd/m²). The new panels are quite efficient (40 lm/W) and Visionox revealed it is using phosphorescent materials. Visionox also unveiled two new OLED lamp designs using the new panels.

AUO accelereates OLED production plans

AU Optronics started to mass-produce small (4.3-inch) AMOLED panels at its 3.5G LTPS line in Taiwan, making about 8,000 substrates a month. The company says its gen. 4.5 AMOLED Line in Singapore (at AFPD) will start AMOLED mass-production before year-end 2012, which is faster than original plans (2H 2013). The new fab's capacity will be 15,000 monthly substrates. AUO also said they have set up an 'experimental' gen. 6 production line with plans to produce large (over 32-inch) samples before the end of 2012.

Japan Display to start producing OLEDs by March 2013

Japan Display (the new small/medium display maker that merged Sony, Hitachi and Toshiba's businesses) announced that it plans to start mass producing OLED displays for smartphones. First panel samples are expected by March 2013. In order to have an edge over Samsung, JD aims to achieve over 300 ppi and develop panels that are more efficient than Samsung's OLEDs. Analysts suggest that JD will try to secure Apple as a customer for their OLED panels.

Samsung Display officially spun off, to merge with SMD

Samsung officially spun off its display subsidiary. The new company is called Samsung Display, and will soon merge with Samsung Mobile Display (SMD) and S-LCD. Samsung Display will be active in both OLEDs and LCDs, but the focus will be on the OLED unit.

Here's a quote from Samsung's PR announcing the spin-off back in February, stating the importance of OLED technology: 'Currently, the display market is undergoing rapid changes with OLED panels expected to fast replace LCD panels to become the mainstream. Amid this structural change of the Display industry, adopting measures for change and innovation, including business restructuring, are essential to improve our competitiveness for our Display business.'

Other top OLED news

Samsung to reveal OLED TV price and full-spec at IFA 2012
On August 31 Samsung plans to disclose the OLED TV's price, spec and product line
An interview with Merck's OLED unit vice president Udo Heider
An interview with Merck's OLED vice president, discussing their OLED materials and Merck's view of the OLED market
11 arrested in Korea over AMOLED technology leak from Samsung to local rival
Investigation in Korea suggest a local rival (perhaps LGD?) stole trade secrets involving Samsung's Small Mask Scanning (SMS) technology
Samsung's flexible OLEDs to be branded Youm?
Samsung may use the Youm brand for its upcoming flexible AMOLED products
Toshiba launches their AMOLED tablet, to ship in June
Toshiba's Excite 7.7 has a 7.7-inch 1,280 x 800 Super AMOLED Plus display, will ship for $500 in June
TPVision to launch OLED TVs in 2012?
Reports suggest that TPVision plans to use LG Display made panels
Sharp begins to produce Oxide TFT (IGZO)-based LCDs
The company revealed some sample specifiations, including a 10-inch 300 ppi panel(2,560 x 1,600)
Panasonic plans to invest $245-370 million on a gen. 6 OLED production line?
Reports claim that Panasonic decided to establish a gen. 6 OLED TV pilot production line in a ¥20-30 billion ($245-370 million) investment
UDC to supply PHOLED materials to Fraunhofer's OLED lighting panels
UDC will supply phosphorescent OLED materials in a two-year agreement.

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