Yesterday we posted on a new OLED monitor, the Asus ProArt PQ22UC with a 21.6" 3840x2160 (204 PPI) OLED panel. It turns out that this panel is produced by JOLED.

This is very interesting news. JOLED indeed announced a few weeks ago that it started commercial production of 21.6" ink-jet printed 4K OLED panels, and it is great to see a product launched so quickly. JOLED's production capacity is not large, the company is still using a pilot-scale line, but it's likely that Asus is not expecting to sell many units of this high-end OLED monitor.

Following JOLED's announcement that it started commercial shipments of its 21.6" 4K OLED panels for use in medical monitors in its low-volume 4.5-Gen ink-jet printing production line, it was reported that the Japanese display maker is seeking to raise $900 million to support its plan to start mass producing OLEDs in 2019.

Reuters reports today that Denso Corp (an automobile parts producers) is considering a $440 million investment in JOLED. Earlier reports from Japan claimed the JOLED received funding commitments from Sony and Panasonic, with both Sumitomo Chemical (who supplies its P-OLED materials to JOLED) and Screen Holdings (who supplies its equipment to JOLED) are likely to take part in the financing round as well. Each of these four companies will invest between $45 to $90 million.

In August 2016 Sharp said that it wants to collaborate with Japan Display to co-develop and produce OLED displays. JDI responded saying that Sharp did not actually reach out regarding such a collaboration, but it seems that Sharp did not give up on that idea.

Sharp's stock returned to the Tokyo Stock Exchange first section after a year of absence, and the company's president told Reuters that it is going to ask Japan's government it help it form an alliance with JDI. Sharp is also considering an investment in JOLED.

A few day go JOLED announced that it started commercial shipments of its 21.6" 4K OLED panels for use in medical monitors, in its low-volume 4.5-Gen ink-jet printing production line.

Following JDI's decision to halt its plans to increase its stake at JOLED, the company is now seeking to raise $900 million to support its plan to start mass producing OLEDs in 2019. According to a report from Japan the company has received commitments from Sony and Panasonic and both Sumitomo Chemical (who supplies its PLED materials to JOLED) and Screen Holdings (who supplies its equipment to JOLED) are likely to take part in the financing round as well.

In June 2017 JOLED announced that it started to sample 21.6" 4K OLED panels, with plans to initiate low volume production at its 4.5-Gen pilot inkjet production line. JOLED announced today that it has began commercial shipments of these panels. We do not know JOLED's first customer but it is likely to be Sony.

JOLED says that it has now achieved the necessary product quality and production yields. The product was already selected for use in medical monitors (again, we believe this is Sony, who we know received JOLED's first samples and already has its own 25" OLED medical monitor that uses Sony's own OLEDs). JOLED also aims to ship these panes to other OLED monitors applications.

As we just posted, Japan Display has decided to halt its plans to turn its minority stake at JOLED into a majority one, and so JOLED is now seeking external financing to support its plan to start mass producing OLEDs in 2019 at the JDI plant in Nomi, Ishikawa (which currently makes LCDs, but will be shut down towards the end of 2017).

According to the Nikkei Asian Review, JOLED aims to raise 100 billion Yen (almost $900 million) from Japanese companies, and it has already approached Sony, Canon, Fujifilm, Nikon and Sumitomo. If this plans fails JOLED may turn to foreign companies, including Chinese ones.

In August 2017, Japan Display announced a strategic focus on OLED displays as the losing display maker failed to keep up with the industry shift to OLEDs. JDI said it will need to raise new funds in order to accelerate its OLED plans and prepare for mass production in 2019.

JDI estimates that it will require more than 200 billion Yen (around $1.77 billion USD) to start mass producing OLEDs in 2019. JDI is now looking for financing partners that will help fund the company's OLED project. It is estimated that it will find it difficult to find a partner in Japan and so JDI is looking for Chinese and Korean display makers. According to the Nikkei Asian Times BOE and CSoT already expressed interest.

Sumitomo Chemical acquired CDT back in 2007, and since then the Japanese company has been developing it's PLED (polymer-based OLED) materials and technologies. While initially Sumitomo aimed to produce materials for displays, in recent years it has focused mostly on OLED lighting materials and even panel production.

A noted exception was Panasonic's OLED TV development project which used printing technologies and Sumitomo's PLED materials. But Panasonic terminated this project in 2013. We speculated that JOLED, which is based on Panasonic's technology (and other technologies as well), uses PLED materials in its prototypes, but we were not sure.

Last month JOLED announced that it started to sample 21.6" 4K OLED monitors. JOLED plans to develop these OLED monitors for medical applications - it will produce these in low volume at its current 4.5-Gen pilot production line, and will start mass production in 2019.

JOLED's CEO, Nobuhiro Higashiiriki, said in a conference that these first samples were shipped to Sony, which may become JOLED's first customer. JOLED says that the company managed to achieve a high quality and long lifetime, which was a challenge due to the printing process used.

JOLED announced that it started to sample 21.6" 4K OLED monitors. These monitors, demonstrated in March 2017, feature a 3840x2160 resolution (204 PPI), a brightness of 350 cd/m² and a contrast ratio of 1,000,000 : 1. The panel thickness is 1.3 mm and the weigh is 500 grams.

JOLED aims to start mass producing these panels in 2019, but will also attempt to sell these to the medical market even in low-volume production out of its current 4.5-Gen pilot production line.