Researchers from Germany's TU Darmstadt University developed new glowing fibers by coating them with white OLED emitters. They call their technology reproducible rotational coating and they envision all sorts of possibilities in the area of smart textiles, as in the future it'll be possible to coat all sorts of semiconductor components (such as transistors or solar cells) on fibers.

The researchers use vacuum deposition and small-molecule OLEDs for this process. They deposit seven different layers but the whole OLED is just 200 nanometers thick. OLEDs require a very smooth substrate and so currently they use glass fibers - which aren't really useful in wearable applications as they are too brittle to be woven into textiles. They are now starting to experiment with polymer-coated glass fibers that may be flexible enough to be used in textiles.

NVIDIA unveiled a new research project that developed a near-eye light field display. A prototype unit was shown that uses two Sony ECX332A OLED microdisplays (1280x720 each). The microdisplays are covered with a micro-lens array which creates the light field.

The basic idea is that users can focus at multiple depth and create a field of view of about 70 degrees. If you wear glasses, this display can account for your glasses using software algorithms. Check out the video above for more info.

A few weeks ago Universal Display changed their ticker symbol from PANL to OLED. This may be good for UDC's business, but it made a mess with the popular Yahoo's investor forums (which still does not point to the correct forum from UDC's quote page). So OLED-Info comes to the rescue (sort of) - and today I launched new investor forums right here on OLED-Info.

Currently there are two forums - for Universal Display investors and for eMagin as well. If these forums are successful, maybe I'll add more forums (not just investment related ones). Happy conversing and good luck with your investments...

Himax just announced that Google bought a 6.3% stake in the company (in Himax Display Inc, to be exact, a daughter company of Himax Technologies). This money will be used to expand Himax's LCoS microdisplay capacity. Google also has an option to buy a further 8.5% of the company.

Himax's LCoS displays are used in Google's Glass HMD prototypes. A couple of months ago there were reports from Korea that Google are in talks with Samsung Display to supply OLED microdisplays for the next-gen Glass product (the first commercial one). I guess that this latest investment means that Google will keep Himax's products and will not opt for OLEDs. At least not for now...

Researchers from the University of California, Berkeley developed a new "electronic-skin" consisting of touch sensors and small OLED lighting 'pixels". The e-skin reacts to touch and the more intense the pressure, the brighter the light. This technology can be used to enable applications such as smart automobile dashboards or wallpaper that double as touchscreen displays.

The e-skin is based on plastic and has several OLED "pixels". Each pixel consists of a tiny transistor (made using nanowires), an OLED and a pressure sensor. To produce this they cured a polymer layer on top of a silicon wafer, ran a regular process to deposit the electronics and then de-laminated the silicon. The first prototype the researchers made has 16x16 pixels (see above and in the video below).

LG Electronics announced today that their curved 55" OLED TV is now available in the US, exclusively through Magnolia stores inside Best Buy. The 55EA9800 costs $14,999 (in South Korea it costs around $13,500) and it is currently on display in Best Buy's store in Richfeld, Minnesota.

In the following weeks more stores will display and sell the OLED TV (in Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Houston, Dallas, San Francisco, Chicago, Seattle and San Antonio) and later on more stores will offer it. According to Pocket Lint, LG's TV is "jaw-droppingly stunning". LG's curved OLED TV features an Oxide-TFT WRGB Full-HD OLED panel (like LG's 55EM9700 'flat' OLED TV). The TV features "infinite" contrast ratio, passive 3D, Smart Touch Controls and a "paper-slim" design (it's only 4.3 mm thick and weighs just 17Kg). It is made from Carbon Fiber-Reinforced Plastic (CFRP).

Feel Lab is a new Japanese company that produces OLED lamps. The company launched their first two products with some unique designs. The first one is the PACO desk lamp which is a desk lamp that is made from a magnetic wood-coated base, one OLED panel and one transparent panel (non illuminated). You can change the location of the panels (they clip magnetically to the base).

The panel used in this lamp is Lumiotec's P04. It's a square panel 97.6 x 97.6 mm in size that features 40 lumens brightness, 10 lm/W and a color temperature of 2800K. The Desk Light is now available in Japan for ¥33,600 (about $336 USD). Here's a nice video showing this interesting lamp in action:

LG Display reported their financial results for Q2 2013. Revenues decreased slightly to $5.8 billion and the net income was $93 million. Overall this was a good report as the company turned profitable and their outlook for Q3 was strong.

Regarding OLEDs, Hee Yeon Kim, LGD's Head of Investor Relations said that the company still sees OLED as their ultimate differentiated products and they will continue to focus on obtaining on OLED business space that would generate profit from this business as early as possible. About 80% of LGD's CapEx in 2013 will go towards OLED and LTPS and other "advanced display effects".

Rolic opened a new development facility in the Netherlands focused on OLED technologies. This will accelerate the company's OLED development and bring them into production, in close cooperation with locally specialized production companies.

In September 2012 Rolic have entered into a research partnership with the Holst Centre, with an aim to develop protective moisture barriers (encapsulation) for flexible electronics applications such as OLED and OPV. As part of that partnership, Rolic are developing new materials that will enable commercialization of of high-end flexible barriers and solutions for improved light out-coupling. This new development center will focus on the implementation and commercialization of those research and development results.

Cynora, Novaled and the University of Regensburg will co-develop new soluble (printable) materials for low-cost high efficiency OLED lighting devices. This new project, called cyCESH is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) with €6.1 million.

Professor Yersin's group a the University of Regensburg will handle material development while Cynora will handle subsequent synthesis and optimization. Novaled will be in handle the application of solution-based-processed, doped transport layers. These three partners form a complete comprehensive partnership for OLED applications.