New York is home to Universal Display’s pilot OLED line

Sara Ver-Bruggen - 15 Oct 2010

Universal Display Corporation (UDC) and Moser Baer Technologies will build a pilot line for producing OLED lighting panels in New York.

Moser Baer Technologies, the US arm of the Indian technology corporation Moser Baer, and UDC will build the line at Canandaigua, at the site of the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering's newly created Smart System Technology & Commercialisation Centre.

Moser Baer Technologies will invest $11.5 million (€8.2 million) in vacuum processing and related equipment for the line.

The project is supported by a $4 million grant, through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which the Department of Energy awarded to UDC earlier in 2010. The line will be able to demonstrate the scalability of UDC's phosphorescent OLED technology and materials for making white OLED lighting panels for commercial lighting markets.

European line

Details of the Moser Baer and UDC pilot line venture have emerged just a few days after Osram's announcement that it is building a €50 million pilot line for making OLED lighting panels in Germany.

Competition in the emerging OLED lighting industry is heating up, as a number of technology firms in Asia - mainly Japan - also invest in pilot production equipment for OLED panels, which have potential to provide energy-efficient lighting for many markets.

The pilot OLED line marks the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering's first significant contract since establishing its commercialisation centre, itself a merger between New York State's Infotonics Technology Centre in Canandaigua and the college's own Centre of Excellence in Nanoelectronics and Nanotechnology.

Additionally, as part of the collaboration, CNSE's STC and Moser Baer Technologies will jointly develop solid-state lighting technologies, which offer further improvements in energy efficiency and performance compared to current technologies.

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