Chinese consulting firm CCID released its 2010-2011 survey on China's OLED industry. In 2010, Chinese companies shipped 1.35 million OLED displays, up 38.2% over last year. OLED makers in China include Visionox, Shanwei Truly, Sichuan CCO and Irico. Both Shanghai Tianme and Irico are in the process of building 4.5-Gen AMOLED fabs, planning to start mass production in 2011. BOE Display and Sichuan CCO are also engaged with AMOLED R&D.

The Chinese government continues its support for the OLED industry, including special funds from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) and tax policies on new display manufacturers imported materials. But there are still several problems in China's OLED industry - key equipment still needs to be imported (from Japan, Korea and the EU) and China needs raw materials. AMOLED development faces great difficulty due to outdated equipment and inadequate management.

Nanomarkets released a new report (OLED Lighting Markets Asia - 2011) in which they predict that the market opportunities in Asia for OLED lighting will generate $2.1 billion by 2016.

Key findings from the report:

• Japan will dominate the OLED lighting business through 2014 despite lingering issues from the earthquake and tsunami. LEDs were quick to be adopted in Japan, and they will do the same with OLEDs. Meanwhile, Japanese firms are taking up key positions in every part of the worldwide OLED lighting supply chain from design and manufacture through to wholesale distribution. Sales of OLED lighting in Japan are expected to reach $1.1 billion by 2016.
• The OLED lighting market in China is limited - and will reach $420 million by 2016.
• OLED lighting in Korea is still in its infancy, and sales will reach only $230 million by 2016. But Samsung and LG have great influence in this market. Nanomarkets thinks that Samsung has a great potential in this market.

China's Irico Display plans to raise ¥6 billion (around $900 million) - out of which ¥1.6 billion (around $245 million) will be used to build an AMOLED fab. According to earlier reports, Irico already has a 4.5-Gen AMOLED pilot production line ready, located at the OLED industrial base in Guangdong province. We assume that the current plan is to build a mass-production 4.5-Gen line.

Irico has begun construction back in March 2009 (investment was $75 million). At least back then, the plan was to produce 2.2" displays. We do not know what kind of displays they plan to produce now.

Earlier today we posted that Sony may have to delay the NGP launch, and now we hear that the Japanese earthquake may disrupt production of equipment required for factories expansion in Korea - including Samsung's 5.5-Gen AMOLED fab.

MK (a Korean business news site) reports that Samsung's AMOLED fab requires some equipment that is imported from Japan, and the company might require to delay operation of the plant. According to Samsung the delay (if at all) will be between one month to three months at most.

While we heard reports that the Japanese earthquake didn't have any serious implications on OLED companies, today we hear that Sony may delay the launch of it's PS2 (NGP) gaming console due to production disruptions. Sony may still launch it in 2011, but in only one region instead of a worldwide launch like they originally planned. We do not know which region may offer it first.

The NGP features a 5" touch OLED display (960x544), a quad-core ARM Cortex A9 processor and a quad-core PowerVR (SGX543MP4+) GPU (Sony says that it is as powerful as a PS3), 3G, GPS, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Gaming controls include dual analog sticks, motion controls and a multi-touch pad on the rear side.

Samsung announced a new phone - the Galaxy S Plus. This is (yet another) Galaxy S variant - with a faster 1.4Ghz processor and Android v2.3. The new phone will be released in Russia towards the end of April for 23,990 rubles (around $850). The display is the same as on the Galaxy S - 4" WVGA Super-AMOLED.

Update: It turns out that even though Amazon.co.uk lists this as 'shipping', when you add it to your cart it states that the shipping date is May 2nd. Thank you anonymous commenter...

According to Amazon.co.uk, the Samsung Galaxy S2 is now shipping for £621.14 (unlocked). Samsung's official release date is May, so this is a bit strange (even though Play.com originally listed March 2011 as the S2 release date, so maybe this is for real).

Samsung's Galaxy S2 is the successor to the popular Galaxy S - with a 4.3" WVGA Super AMOLED plus display, 1Ghz dual-core processor, NFC, Bluetooth 3 and HSPA+. It's only 8.49mm thick at its thinnest point.

I got word from a CMEL AMOLED user that some displays fail after prolonged exposure to sun. Interestingly, the displays seem to recover if left unpowered for a couple of days (out of the sun, that is). I wonder if any other AMOLED user experienced similar problems? In any case, here's a video they uploaded showing the problematic displays:

The CMEL module used by this company is a C0283QGLC-T. This is a 2.83" diagonal 240x320 full-color AMOLED. CMEL no longer produces AMOLEDs (after the merger into CMI) - but CMI seems to have an active OLED program that will soon go into production.