December 2012

Update: I just got word from OLEDworks, and it seems that that article is not correct. In fact, OLEDWorks and Cambridge Trust reached a settlement and the encapsulation tool is already installed at OLEDWorks. Good to hear.

According to a reports OLEDWorks filed a lawsuit against Cambridge Trust bank, seeking an emergency court order to stop the bank from pulling out of a deal to sell two thin-film coating machines to OLEDWorks. OLEDWorks say that they signed deals with customers to supply OLED lighting panel samples in time for the Lightfair trade show in April, and if they do not get these machine quickly they will not be able to do so.

OLEDworks signed an agreement with Cambridge Nanotech in October to buy their used coating machine (called the Phoenix) for $540,00 (a new one costs about $750,000). Later when Cambridge Trust bank took over Cambridge Nanotech, they agreed to actually supply the Phoenix and a second, larger-capacity coating machine (called the Tahiti II) to OLEDWorks - both for only $350,000 (the Tahiti II is word about $1.5 million). Later the bank found a different buyer and decided not to honor the agreement.

Earlier today we posted that according to a Chinese TV commercial, LG is set to release their OLED TV in April. One of our readers (thanks Chewi!) sent us a link to a Russian site that claims that LG plans to launch the 55" TV in Russia in March 2013. The price? 499,990 Rubles, or about $16,500 (considerably more expensive then earlier estimates of $10,000). The site says that LG's store in Moscow already accepts pre-orders (hopefully one of our Russian readers can confirm this?).

So all those reports are not official, but hopefully LG indeed plans to finally release the TV in Q1 2013. They already announced that they will show an updated model at CES in January 2013, and the OLED TV already passed FCC inspection, towards a US release.

I just found this interesting video showing LG's 55" OLED TV, the 55EM9700 in what appears to be a Chinese TV commercial. Towards the end (2:09) they notice the release date, April 2013:

This is obviously far from official, but maybe that's when LG hopes to launch this TV in China. We do hope/know that LG aims to release the TV soon. Today they announced that they will show an updated model at CES in January 2013, and the OLED TV already passed FCC inspection, towards a US release.

Apple OLED rumors never die. This time these are rather different rumors. According to a Chinese tech blog, Apple and Intel are jointly developing a bluetooth smart watch. This new iWatch (or whatever they'll call it) will have a 1.5" touch PMOLED, apparently made by RitDisplay.

I'm usually quite skeptic on Apple AMOLED rumors, because there's still not enough AMOLED capacity to be used in iPhone or iPod devices. But ramping up PMOLED capacity shouldn't' be a problem for RiTDisplay (which used to have larger capacity than today, but they shut down some lines due to financial problems). Anyway, if this is true, it's great news for my friends over at RiTDisplay.

Global OLED Technology (GOT) has filed a lawsuit against Eastman Kodak, claiming that 18 of Kodak's patent actually belong to GOT. Kodak says that these 18 patents are not related to OLED technologies and so were not part of the 2009 deal (when GOT bought about 2,200 OLED patents and patent applications from Kodak). We do not what are the actual patents involved.

GOT is also seeking to recover royalty payments from Pioneer that were paid to Kodak and not GOT. The Pioneer license was supposed to have been transferred to GOT but apparently Kodak wasn't able to obtain consent for the transfer.

LG announced that it is bringing its OLED TVs to CES 2013 (January 8-11)- and the company further enhanced its 55" WRGB OLED TV in technology and in design. The new model weighs just 3.5Kg (500 grams less than the older one shown at CES 2012) and is still 4mm thick. As LG says in its PR: "LG Display is truly laying the prologue for the new OLED TV era".

LG's OLED TV features FPR passive 3D, 100,000,000:1 contrast ratio and fast response time (1,000 times faster than LCD according to LG). The TV is based on LG Display's Oxide-TFT white-OLED with color filters (WRGB) OLED panel. The TV is expected to launch in 2013 for a price of around $10,000 at first. Earlier this month the TV (model 55EM9700-UA) passed through the FCC as it includes Wi-Fi and Bluetooth modules and so needs to get approved by the FCC before it can be sold in the US.

Konica Minolta collaborated with Washi paper designer Eriko Horiki to create a unique luminous tapestry named "Lighting that breathes". Eriko says that this work "imbues the space with rich expression by synthesizing multiple elements: light, mirror, pinhole and Washi paper. This gives us a sense of what lighting of the future might hold".

Here are a couple of videos showing the making of this washi/OLED design:

Digitimes reports that BOE Display has signed a $5.26 billion investment agreement with the Chinese government to construct a new 8.5G line within the western China municipality. BOE will start construction in Q3 2013, and the new line will be complete by Q1 2015. It's monthly capacity will reach 90,000 substrates.

BOE Ordos 5.5-Gen AMOLED fab

It's not clear yet what technology is planned for this fab, but Digitimes says it's probably either UHD (4K2K) LCd panels or AMOLED panels. I personally do not think it's likely for BOE to plan such large substrates for OLED technology.

2012 is soon over, now's the time to reflect back... here are the top 10 stories posted on OLED-Info in the past year, ranked by popularity (i.e. how many people read the story):

1. LG releases new photos, details on their upcoming 55" OLED TV (Jan 2)
2. The Galaxy Note 2 uses a non-pentile OLED display at 267 PPI (Sep 5)
3. Super AMOLED vs Super-LCD and HD-IPS on video (Feb 28)
4. DisplaySearch: LG's OLED TV will cost $8,000, will drop to $4,000 by end of 2013 (Jan 3)
5. Samsung flexible OLEDs to be branded YOUM? (Apr 8)
6. TABOLA transparent and structured OLEDs now shipping, we go hands on (Apr 23)
7. LG Chem starts mass producing 45 lm/W OLED panels, plans more efficient, flexible and transparent panels (Feb 9)
8. Philips releases an OLED lighting roadmap, sees flexible 1x1 meter OLEDs by 2018 (Feb 27)
9. Verbatim Velve OLED lighting panel hands on review (Jul 6)
10. LG to launch their 55" OLED TV in May for around $7,900 (Mar 27)

Here's for an awesome 2013. Hopefully this year we'll actually see OLED TV and flexible OLED launches... May you all enjoy the holidays!

The European MOMA project (eMbedded Organic Memory Arrays) has developed the largest re-programmable non-volatile memory arrays yet produced on flexible substrates. The project developed two prototypes - a 256-bit transistor-based one and 1-kbit diode-based arrays.

MOMA is now drawing to a successful close, and the partners hope that it will lead towards commercialization of flexible electronics applications with embedded memory. In the remaining months of the project, the partners will combine all these building blocks into a 96-bit array with the related read/write circuitry, creating a complete embedded flexible memory suitable for applications such as Electronic Product Code (EPC) tags.