Bloomberg says that Apple is in discussions with BOE Display to supply OLED displays for next generation iPhones. According to the story, Apple has been testing BOE's displays for months but has not made a decision yet. The deal under discussion is not for the 2017 iPhone (which will exclusively use Samsung-made OLED), but for the one coming in 2018 or maybe even later.

The 2017 iPhone 8 (or will it be a >$1000 iPhone X?) will reportedly use AMOLED displays for at least one variant. These will be produced by Samsung Display, and reports from 2016 suggested that Apple paid $4.3 billion upfront to secure 100 million panels. A couple of days ago it was reported that Apple ordered an extra 60 million OLED panels from Samsung Display.

According to a report from Korea, Apple ordered an extra 60 million flexible OLED panels from Samsung Display for the next-generation iPhone, in a deal worth 5 trillion Korean Won, or about $4.3 billion.

The report says that this deal is an addition to Apple's original OLED order in late 2016. That 2016 deal, for 100 million OLEDs, was estimated at $4.3 billion as well, so it may be that this is actually the same display order that is just now being reported again.

IHS says that the OLED industry is now entering a huge capacity-growth phase, and IHS estimates that the AMOLED production equipment market will reach $9.5 billion in revenues in 2017.

Almost half of that amount will go to TFT backplane equipment ($4.4 billion in 2017), while the organic layer deposition market will reach 2.2 billion and the encapsulation tools market will reach $1.2 billion. IHS estimates that Canon Tokki is the leader in OLED deposition equipment, and has a market share of over 50%.

There are many reports that detail Apple's 2017 iPhone lineup, and it seems quite certain that Apple will indeed release a high-end iPhone model that will adopt a flexible OLED. Those OLEDs will be produced by Samsung Display (Apple apparently paid $4 billion in advance to secure those displays).

According to a new report from Fast Company, Apple will introduce three new iPhones in 2017 - the iPhone 7S and 7S Plus, with 4.7" and 5.5" LCD displays, and premium 5.8" iPhone that will sport the OLED display. Fast Company says that this phone will be called the iPhone X (as in the 10th iPhone), and it introduce several new features (besides the new display technology) - and carry a price tag of over $1,000.

LG launched two new smart watches based on Android Wear 2.0, designed in collaboration with Google. Both new devices use round flexible OLED displays, and both will launch tomorrow in the US.

The first model is the Watch Style, which sports a round 1.2" 360x360 display, 512MB of RAM and 4GB of storage. The Watch Style costs $249 - $279.

Researchers from South China University of Technology developed a new OLED structure that promises to enable low-cost efficient fluorescent OLED devices. The so-called pn-OLED structure is inspired by p-n junction theory and inorganic LED design.

The pn-OLED uses a highly-efficient emission-layer-free OLED, in which the p-type and n-type organic semiconductors are sandwiched vertically between an ITO anode and a lithium fluoride/aluminum cathode. The luminescent center of the pn-OLED is located in the pn junction region. The light-emission behavior of this device is a result of the synergetic energy release from both the p-type and n-type materials. This is in contrast to conventional OLEDs, where the light generation occurs from single-molecule emitters.

BOE Display announced that it signed an agreement with a Hefei municipal government to co-invest 1 billion CNY (around $145 million USD) in a new OLED TV production line in Hefei. BOE will invest 80% of the funds, and the rest will be provided by the Hefei government.

BOE already has a 8.5-Gen pilot line in Hefei, which is actually producing commercial OLED TV panels, albeit in very small volumes. It 2014 it was reported that BOE plans a $1 billion OLED TV line in Hefei.

Towards the end of 2015 LG Display announced that it plans to build a new OLED fab (P10) in Paju in a $8.7 billion investment. The P10 will produce both mid-sized flexible OLED and large-sized OLED TV panels. Production was planned for the first half of 2018.

ETNews now reports that LG is indeed constructing the new fab (as can be seen in the image above) and the company is on track to finish the project by Q2 2018 (although mass production will probable take longer).

Universal Display announced that the company will invest $15 million in PPG Industries' OLED facility in Barberton, Ohio. PPG will double its commercial production capacity of UDC's phosphorescent OLED emitter materials. The capacity expansion is scheduled to be completed in the third quarter 2017.

PPG Industries and UDC established a strategic relationship in 2000, and PPG is the exclusive producer of UDC's PHOLED emitter materials. In 2013, the two companies opened this OLED production plant in Barbertron as demand for OLED materials increased.

According to Digitimes Research, OLED display makers in China will increase their total annual capacity from 272,000 m² in 2016 to 7.86 million m² in 2020 - a CAGR or 131.9%.

The largest producer in 2020 will be BOE Display (35% of the Chinese OLED market), followed by Tianma (17.6%), Visionox (14%), Everdisplay (11.6%), CSoT (9.5%), Truly (7.8%) and Royole (4.5%).