Latest stories about OLED TV

OLEDNet has published an OLED market forecast for 2010-2016. Basically the say that during 2010, Samsung will introduce 5" and 7" AMOLEDs, and LG Display will produce 2.7" AMOLED for digital cameras, 3.5" WVGA for mobile phones and 4.3" OLEDs for portable TVS. Toshiba Mobile Displays (TMD) will begin AMOLED small panel production during 2010 as well.

Toshiba, Matsushita and Hitachi are all expected to introduce 20"-40" OLED TV panels as early as 2011. AUO will begin mass production in 2011, too.

Via OLEDNet

Samsung Mobile Display's president of engineering Brian Berkeley said yesterday that Samsung is accelerating its development of OLED displays, including increasing  the size and volume to enable rollout of OLED TVs. Samsung has been critical of OLED TVs in the past years, but things are changing: there's high volume AMOLED production, with millions of OLED displays for mobile devices shipping each month.

Samsung 30-inch 3D OLED TV prototype

Samsung are now making huge investments in OLEDs, including development of medium to large sized panels. They are actually working on how to scale a Gen 4 sized plants (like they have today) to a Gen 7 or even a Gen 8, which will be able to make TV panels economically. This will require either much more powerful lasers working much more quickly than today's process for creating the backplane on which they deposit the OLEDs, or some alternative technology. There are also issues in color patterning, for which Samsung thinks it has a new unique solution, and OLED printing.

Berkeley predicts that a 40" OLED TV will use only 10 watts in about five years (compared to 40 watts today for a 40" LCD). He also said that the technology will be great for 3D TVs (image switching is quicker and so left and right images are completely separated).

Merck are working toward solution-processable OLED materials, and are now saying that they expect to have a green material that is comparable to vacuum processable green within 9 months. Merck's materials will be suited for large-area panels such as OLED TV panels.  

Merck's OLED material development started in 2005 when they bought Covion. They say that the NEMO project (started in 2009) was a real boost to the performance of their materials.

Via +PlasticElectronics

LG Electronics announced today that they will release their EL9500 15" OLED TV in May in Europe. It will cost 1999 euro ($2700) - similar to the cost in Korea. The 15" panel has 1366x768 resolution and is only 1.7mm thick.

Via LGE Austria

Sony says that they have stopped production of the XEL-1 OLED TV in Japan, and will stop selling it when they run out of inventory. They will continue to sell and produce the OLED TV for the US, EU and other markets though (which is a bit confusing, because they say they stopped producing it). Sony will also continue their OLED R&D. Still no news on any upcoming larger OLED TVs...

Sony XEL-1 OLED TV

Via Reuters

Tech-On has posted an interesting article about OLED TV status. They discuss the situation of the technology, why is it so difficult to make a large OLED panel, and how are the various TV makers trying to solve the issues.

I think the two most interesting points are: 

• They suggest that because LCDs have got so good in terms of efficiency,thinness and quality, it'll be hard for OLEDs to compete. Instead companies try to open new markets with transparent or flexible OLEDs, things that cannot be done with LCDs. Indeed we can see Samsung, Sony and LG all showing these kinds of displays. I think we may also add 3D OLED TVs to the mix here.
• They say that LG plans to volume produce 20" OLED panels in 2010. This is the first time we hear of such plans (beside a promise for 'larger panels' a few weeks ago). LG also plans 30" OLED TVs in 2011, and 40" in 2012.

Here's the link to Tech-On's article.

Sony has installed 20 XEL-1 OLED TVs in the press gallery of the Amsterdam ArenA stadium. It seems that the responses has been great, and people are very impressed with the performance of the OLED TV displays. .

Via HDTV Nieuws