Olympus' XZ1 OLED camera is now shipping for $429. The XZ-1 is an "enthusiast compact" camera with a bright lens (F1.18 at 28mm and F2.5 at 112mm), 10mp sensor and image stabilization. The display is a 3" VGA OLED. The camera can record 720p videos and has a built-in flash and a hotshoe.
There are reports that Samsung Mobile Displays plans to build a new AMOLED fab in Tianjin, China. SMD already has a subsidiary in Tianjin (apparently making LCD displays). Investment and schedule hasn't been finalized yet.
Update: Play.com updated their page, and the release date is now listed as May 6...
According to Play.com, Samsung's Galaxy S2 will ship on March 31st. The price is £600 for an unlocked phone (no contract). If true this will probably be the first Super AMOLED Plus phone that actually ships. The Galaxy S2 has a WVGA 4.3" Super AMOLED plus display, 1Ghz dual-core processor, NFC, Bluetooth 3 and HSPA+. It's only 8.49mm thick at its thinnest point.
Researchers from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) developed a new Graphene-based technology that can be used to create OLED displays. Originally they used the new technology to create flexible rechargeable batteries.
It's not clear from the original article how can this be used exactly to enhance OLEDs...
OSRAM announced two new Orbeos OLED lighting panels - a rectangular and a round panel, both are mirrored and warm-white in color. The original Orbeos panel was also round and warm-white in color, but was not mirrored (but rather "diffused"). The new panels are also thinner then before (1.8mm vs 2.1 in the older panel). Here's our hands-on review of the original Orbeos panel.
So now Osram offers 3 panels:
Digitimes says that AMOLED display shipments reached 13.5 million in 3Q 2010 - up 132% compared to last year and up 65% from 2Q. In terms of revenue, AMOLED passed 10% of the total small display market (and reached 10.7%, up from 6.4% in 2Q).
Samsung Galaxy S
The success was driven by smart phone displays, mainly for Samsung and Nokia phones. 4" 480x800 AMOLEDs accounted for 81% of all AMOLEDs sold - 11 million units.
Philips announced a new discounted OLED kit for a limited time. The Lumiblade Special Kit contains 3 white OLEDs (rectangle, dot and square) and the electronics driver. The price is 490⬠(instead of 671⬠before the discount). The offers starts today and will run until March 10th.
If you're interested in the kit, you can buy online in the Lumiblade shop. Here's our hands-on review of Philips' Lumiblade OLED panels.
AUO will invest $25 million in their Singapore subsidiary, AFPD. The money will be used to purchase equipment for ramping up its AMOLED capacity in their 4.5-Gen LTPS fab. The fab will have a monthly capacity of 45,000 substrates.
AUO's 2nd AMOLED plant, their 3.5-Gen line in Taiwan will begin production in 2Q 2011 (with a monthly capacity of 7,000 substrates).
German design firm Benwirth Licht created a new modular OLED/LED lamp called Cluster+. The lamp uses both LEDs and OLEDs (OSRAM's ORBEOS panels, in fact) to create unique designs. The idea is that you can arrange the lamp in whatever design you want, and so use it as a chandelier, desk lamp, wall lamp and any other arrangement you can think of.
The basic building block is a square that contains either one circular ORBEOS OLED panel or four LEDs. The square block is about 5 square inches in size (and less than 1/8 of an inch thick).
Here's a nice video showing LG's new NOVA LCD display side by side with a Super AMOLED (a Galaxy S phone) and Apple's iPhone 4 Retina Display (which is also an LCD). LG says that the NOVA displays are 50% brighter than the LCD and will consume about half the power than an AMOLED display on a white screen.
