December 2015

Since Apple adopted a flexible AMOLED display for the Watch, people have been speculating that the company is also looking into using OLEDs for their smartphones and tablets. Reports that Apple is talking with both Samsung Display and LG Display regarding a future OLED display supply deal surfaced in past weeks.

Yesterday Reuters cited the Electronics Times saying that SDC and LGD are close to signing an agreement with Apple. The two display makers will invest $12.8 billion together to increase OLED capacity for Apple. Reuters says that Apple will likely provide some funding to LG and Samsung, and Samsung will get the larger share of the OLED volume.

Visionox announced that it started to mass produce 1.45" AMOLED displays for wearable applications. The 1.45" panel features a resolution of 272x340 (300 PPI) and is less than one mm thick with a 1.5 mm frame. The display offers both MIPI and SPI interfaces.

Visionox also announced that the first product to use this display will be a smartwatch that will be on sale in China in February 2016. Visionox further revealed that they achieved the first AMOLED design win for a mobile phone, and the first phone that uses their 5.5" AMOLED panel announced in June will ship globally in March 2016.

2015 is pretty much over - and this has been a great year for the OLED industry. OLED displays are reaching more smartphones and wearables - and OLED TVs and flexible OLEDs have finally entered the market for real. And the future looks good too, with major OLED investments promised and expected by the leading display makers.

Here are the top 10 stories posted on OLED-Info in 2015, ranked by popularity (i.e. how many people read the story):

1. Danish site publishes LG's 2015 OLED TV price list (Jan 11)
2. LG Display demonstrates 0.97 mm thick 55" flat OLED TV panels (May 19)
3. Philips aims to spin-off its OLED lighting business unit (Jan 27)
4. LG announces six new OLED TVs, including the world's first bendable TV (Jan 5)
5. Everdisplay demonstrates a 6" 4K (734 PPI) AMOLED display (Aug 6)
6. Samsung reportedly plans its comeback to the OLED TV market with WRGB panels (Mar 29)
7. LG's 55" curved 4K OLED TV, the EG9600 is now shipping for $5,499 (Mar 11)
8. Researchers claim new method can increase OLED efficiency by 3,000% (Jun 24)
9. LG Chem's 320x320 mm OLED lighting panel now in production, company develops new integration solutions (Jan 16)
10. LGD plans to ship 600,000 OLED TV panels in 2015 and 1.5 million in 2016 (Jan 7)

Towards the end of October 2015, Workrite Ergonomics launched their first OLED lamp, the Natural OLED desk light. The Natural uses a single 320x110 mm OLED panel produced by LG (the N6BB40C panel). This panel offers 442 lumens at 13.7 W (32 lm/W), a high CRI (94) and a neutral white light - 3900K. The lifetime of the Natural is rated at 30,000h (LT70) at the lowest brightness setting. The Natural is now shipping for $239.

The nice guys at Workrite were kind enough to send us a desk lamp for a review here at OLED-Info. I gave the lamp to our very own Roni Peleg to try out and write this review, which you can read below.

According to the Nikkei Asian Review, Sumitomo Chemical plans to invest 20 billion yen (about $165 million USD) to increase its OLED touch panel production capacity at its Pyeongtaek factory by 40%. The new production line will be able to produce touch panels on glass substrates - and also on plastic ones for bendable displays.

Sumitomo's current capacity enables it to produce around 200 million touch panels per year for OLED displays specifically, supplying panels mainly for Samsung Display. Sumitomo is expecting a rapid expansion of the OLED market and is getting ready to increased OLED touch panel demand.

A few weeks ago the owners of the OLED.com domain (not related to OLED-Info!) decided to put it up for auction. This is an unprecedented opportunity to give your OLED product marketing a huge boost, by buying the best domain for this industry...

OLED.com is listed at Flippa.com - and the auction ends in 2 days. This is the last chance to own this domain, and I truly hope it will end up at the hands of one of the leading OLED producers or other companies from within the industry - and not in the hands of domainers that may simply use it for an OLED TV or something like that.

Taiwan's PMOLED maker WiseChip Semiconductors licensed National Tsing-Hua University's blue-light free OLED lighting technology, with an aim to mass produce panels. Supported by the Taiwanese government, Wisechip aims to start mass producing those 1900K OLEDs within two years.

Today we have some more information on this interesting project. National Tsing Hua updates that they have now developed (together with Wisechip) a 2nd-gen lighting panel that features an efficiency of 70 lm/W and is 5x15 cm in size. The University has been awarded two OLED lighting awards (a Taiwanese golden-award and the IDA Lighting Design Award).

A couple of weeks ago, IHS said that 79 million AMOLED displays shipped in Q3 2015 - a new record high. Today IHS released the following chart showing AMOLED (and other screen types) mobile phone shipments in 2015:

IHS says that 2015 will be a "banner year" for AMOLED as more and more display makers are adopting the new screen type in their high-end smartphones. In fact, IHS says that "The simpler structure and better picture performance of AMOLED screens may even encourage Apple to consider adopting the technology in the future".

Next month LG will unveil a new premium home appliance brand - the LG Signature. This is the first time LG integrates different kinds of home appliances under one brand. The new ultra-premium line will target the "sensible rich".

LG further said that the new Signature line will consist (at first) of washing machines, refrigerators, air purifiers - and OLED TVs. The LG Signature OLED TV is focused on its essential element, a screen display - and will have no other elements to let users fully immerse in the image.

According to reports from Korea, Samsung expects smartphone sales to fall by around 12% in 2016 compared to 2015. Global smartphone sales growth is slowing (to around 10% annually) and Samsung is seeing competition from Chinese brands that produce high-end phones at lower prices.

The reports suggest that Samsung will focus on budget handsets next year - as demand for the mid-range A series and low-end J series has been better than expected. The company is also planning to announce the new flagship GS7 soon - maybe during the MWC conference in February (I hope they do as we plan to attend this conference).