Digitimes reports that Nokia are optimistic about OLEDs, and plan to release more handsets with OLED displays in 2009. Currently Nokia ships the N85, that has a 2.6 AMOLED. We know of at least one more OLED phone that's coming soon, the N86.

Nokia N86

Digitimes also say that the two OLED suppliers to Nokia are Samsung (SMD) and TPO, who started making OLEDs at the end of 2008.

UsersPress from Korea reports on some mobile phone sales figures. The say that the Samsung Ultra Touch S8300 is selling great, and in fact has sold over 500,000 units within the first month, just in Europe.

Samsung S8300 Ultra Touch

The S8300 has a 2.8" WQVGA AMOLED. It's a 3G (USDPA/UMTA/EDGE/GPRS/GSM) slider phone with a 8Mp camera, DivX support (and many other formats), video recording, A-GPS, FM radio and 80MB of internal memory with microSDHC slot. It's available now on Amazon for 500$ unlocked.

Update: Philips sent us a new white OLED square, here's our hands-on review of it

The kind folks from Philips have sent me a couple of OLED light panel samples to review. Philips have started to offer these panels online, but you can't actually get them yet. The kits are not ready, and the one I got was without a proper box and manuals. As this is just a lamp, really, it's pretty simple to use. You get a driver-box, that's got a dimmer and an on/off switch. I also got two panels:

• Small rectangle in blue color (Height 43.7mm, 47.4mm)
• White freeform (height 39.4mm, width 73.1mm)

The first thing you notice is how thin these panels are. It is amazing at first to have a light source so thin. After a while you get used to it, and now it seems strange that normal lamps have to be so big! Once these kind of lights are available, I'm sure no one will want to go back...

The freeform one has a lot of 'speckles' on it. It turns out that it got damaged in the shipment (or perhaps Israeli customs, who handled it and opened it, are to blame). Philips promised to send another white panel, so I'll be able to post new photos in a week or so. UPDATE: Philips indeed sent me a new, working white OLED square... 

Those panels have 1,000 cd/m2 brightness, are up to 20 lm/w in efficiency, and Philips say that the lifetime is 10,000 hours. They are also very thin - 1.8mm in fact. Here's how they look when lighted:

The panels are not very bright, and you need several of those panels to create a lamp. In fact when Philips showed their table lamp design, it had more then 10 panels. So if you're thinking of ordering those for a test, be sure to order enough.

Samsung electronics and LG has announced that they will co-develop OLED deposition equipment. The two companies are also working on joint R&D projects for LCD equipment. 

The Samsung i8910 Omnia HD, with its 3.7" touch AMOLED (640x360) is now selling in the UK in the Orange network. It can even be bought for free (with a plan of course).

Samsung i8910 Omnia HD

Other than the OLED, the i8910 has HD video capture at 24fps, 8mp camera, DNLA connectivity, Wi-Fi and GPS. No word yet on a US release date and prices.

Cuttlefish are able to change their skin color quickly. Now scientists from MIT are working to create displays that are extremely efficient - using less than one-hundredth the power of today's TVs. Cuttlefish use chemicals to change the space between membranes on their skin. The researchers have created an artificial electrical system that controls spacing between layers in their display, thus changing the color.

The prototype display is several inches across, and only one micron thick - inside there are around 20 layers of polystrene and responsive poly-2 vinyl. The poly-2 vinyl expands as the voltage increases, becoming thicker, and reflecting longer wavelengths of light. Without electricity it is clear.

Physicists from the Technical University of Dresden, together with Novaled has developed a new white OLEDs with efficiency of 90lm/w. They have used a new emission layer design and improved light outcoupling concepts. In fact, with special 3D outcoupling measures, they have achieved 124 lm/W.

Both values
were determined in an integrating sphere with blocked substrate edges,
only taking the light into account that is emitted to the forward
hemisphere, CIE color coordinates are (0.41/0.49). An in depth article
is published in today’s highly esteemed research journal ‘nature’.

The potential of the devices is obvious when one considers that even at
the very high brightness of 5,000 cd/m² a power
efficiency of 74 lm/W is obtained, comments Prof. Karl Leo, Director of the Institute of Applied Photophysics (IAPP, TU Dresden). Thus high-intensity illuminations at very high efficiencies are
possible as well.

The Sony X-series OLED walkman finally arrives in the US. It is now listed in Amazon.com, and also got a price: 399$ for 32GB, 299$ for 16GB. There's no word yet when it'll be released.

Sony X-series OLED walkman

The OLED walkman has a 3" (432x240) OLED touchscreen display and WiFi support. Sony says it's the best sounding walkman ever...

Densitron now offers all AMOLED displays with a capacitive touch-sensor, already assembled. It's got a transparency of more than 90% - the AMOLED's brightness and colors stay true.

A
glass or acrylic window of less than 1mm can be added onto the touch
layer to waterproof and further protect the front of the capacitive
sensor from scratch. Densitron has
combined the connections of the AMOLED display and the capacitive touch
sensor, enabling a single connector to be used for the assembled unit.

If you want more information the Denstiron's display, please contact us for details.

Telecoms Korea reports that Samsung are planning to release a new phone (SCH-W760) that supports video-calls using infra red. That means that even if you are in the dark, the phone will still be able to transmit a black-and-white video.

The W760 will also have a 2.8" AMOLED, satellite DMB, 3mp camera, bluetooth, MP3 player and a flashlight. It will be available only in Korea for SK Telecom users.