DisplaySearch posted an interesting blog post, in which they say that following the release of the Samsung Galaxy Round and the LG G Flex smartphones, flexible displays may have finally reached critical mass. DisplaySearch estimates that new device with flexible OLEDs in various form factors will reach the market in 2014.

DisplaySearch further says that in the optimistic scenario, the flexible OLED market could grow as fast as 151% CAGR to exceed $20 billion in 2020. Several manufacturing technology issue still needs to be sorted out before this happens, but it is possible that innovations will continue to increase flexibility and lower costs.

Researchers from Mexico's Universidad Veracruzana developed a new OLED emitter molecule that can produce both Red, Green and Blue colors. These so-called multicromoforico molecules may enable simpler OLED material fabrication.

The researchers explain that the color of the emitted light in these new molecules can be modified by the addition of cromoforicas small molecules that bind to the main system through supramolecular interactions.

The UK's' Centre for Process Innovation (CPI) produced a range of flexible OLED lighting demonstrators. These prototypes were manufactured at CPI's OLED/OPV prototyping line. The CPI made several panels on a range of substrates with thickness ranging from 50µm to 125µm.

Those devices are made from an ITO anode, evaporated hole injection layer, co-evaporated emissive layer and a conventional cathode. The OLEDs are encapsulated using a pressure sensitive adhesive and a commercially available barrier material. The CPI's researchers are investigating a number of methods for device encapsulation and are collaborating with adhesive, getter, and barrier film suppliers.

Switzerland-based Glas Troesch unveiled a glass showcase with embedded OLED panels. The showcase (unveiled at the SwissBau construction fair) uses six LG Chem OLED panels (100x100 mm, 60 lm/W, 4000K).

Interestingly the OLED panels in this showcase are reporetedly connected wirelessly to the power source and are embedded in the glass shelf itself (they probably mean transparent conductors). This showcase will also be on show at the Frankfurt Light & Building event in April. It's not clear whether this is a commercial product or just a prototype.

A team of researchers from North Carolina State University have launched a new crowd funding project at Experiment.com, trying to raise a small amount of money ($400 to $800) to begin a new research that potentially may have implications for OLED applications, as they may enable simple and environmentally friendly OLED emitters.

The researchers developed a new method to form carbon-carbon bonds, which include the formation of spirocyclic carbon centers. Those kinds of molecules have been shown by others to be potentially useful as OLED materials but are difficult to synthesize in bulk, and this research hopes to solve this issue.

BLU's VIVO 4.8 HD is a mid-range smartphone that features a 4.8" 720x1280 Super AMOLED panel. This phone is now shipping in the US, via Amazon.com, unlocked for $279.99.

Beside that 4.8" OLED, the phone features a 8 mp camera, 1.5Ghz quad-core CPU, 1GB of RAM and 16 GB of storage. It runs Android 4.2.

Market research company Yole Developpement released a new report (Market & Technology Trends in Materials & Equipment for Printed & Flexible Electronics) in which they estimate that by 2020, the equipment & materials market for printed & flexible electronics will reach $1.65 billion.

Yole estimates that the materials market will emerge in 2018, driven by the OLED industry (in 2020, the material market for printed and flexible OLEDs will reach $170 million). The equipment market will ramp-up in 2015. Yole expects the OLED equipment market to reach $1.3 billion in 2020.

LG Display posted a very interesting article explaining their flexible OLEDs, and giving some predictions (based on IHS DisplayBank estimates) about the flexible OLED market. A couple of months ago LG already stated that they see a very bright future for flexible OLEDs and they intend to take the lead in this emerging display market.

So first of all, LGD explains the structure of their flexible OLED panel (see below). It is based on a plastic (polyimide) substrate as we already know, and LG gives some more information about their Face Seal method which was discussed before but with very little details.

Update: It turns out that Plastic Logic didn't actually demonstrate the flexible OLED prototype. They did show a presentation, in which they revealed that the current first-gen prototype is monochrome (red) and quite simple. They do intend to keep producing new demonstrators throughout 2014.

Novaled (owned by Samsung) and Plastic Logic announced that during 2014 they will demonstrate truly flexible, plastic, full-organic AMOLED displays. The first-gen display was demonstrated at the FlexTech conference in Phoenix last week. Plastic Logic hopes that the technology will be ready for adoption by display makers towards the end of 2014.

The two companies say that this is the first time an all-plastic AMOLED produced in a low-temperature manufacturing process is demonstrated. The display uses Novaled's PIN OLED materials and Plastic Logic's OTFT backplane. The display also used organic materials from Merck (probably the emitters).

Update: Today Amazon updated the price again, now LG's OLED TV is down to $6,499!

In August 2013 LG launched their 55" FHD curved OLED TVs in the US $14,999. The price kept falling quickly and a couple of months ago LG started offering the 55EA9800 for $8,499. I just found out that without any official word from LG, Amazon are currently offering the TV for only $6,999!. Yes, that's more than a 50% discount from the price only six months ago!

I hope that LG will keep this new low price down. Hopefully when LG's upcoming M2 Gen-8 OLED TV fab starts making panels in a few months, the prices will be reduced even further.