Universal Display announced that it is going to acquire Adesis, Inc - a privately held contract research organization with 43 employees specializing in organic and organometallic synthetic R&D and commercialization. UDC will pay $36 million in cash for Adesis.

Adesis has worked with UDC over the last few years, to help advance and accelerate a number of UDC's product offerings.

Researchers from Korea's ETRI Institute developed the world's first transparent OLED prototype that uses a graphene transparent electrode. A prototype display was demonstrated at SID 2016 last month.

The prototype display was 26x26 mm in size, with a resolution of 155x60 (121 PPI). The display was a monochrome (orange) display. In the display on show, the graphene-based electrodes were deposited on the backplane of the display.

In October 2013, the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) launched a new flexible OLED lighting project called R2D2 with an aim to investigate new production technologies, including roll-to-roll techniques.

R2D2's coordinator Fraunhofer FEP, now reports that the project has been successfully completed. OLED production processes and market sectors were thoroughly analyzed, the potential for improvement was identified and realized. The project partners developed a series of OLED lighting applications combining special design features with efficient fabrication techniques.

In its latest forecasts, IHS expects 830,000 OLED TVs to ship in 2016. The market will grow to 1.4 million in 2017 and 5.8 million in 2020. IHS lowered its OLED TV forecasts as it does not see Samsung returning to the OLED TV market, and because of limited mass production capacity.

The previous IHS forecast, made earlier in 2016, predicted 8.5 million OLED TVs in 2020 - so the new forecast is 32% lower.
 

IHS estimates that 90.8 million OLED panels shipped in Q1 2016, and most of these (87.35 million) used in smartphones. 2 million panels were used in smartwatches. IHS also estimates that 145,000 OLED TVs shipped in Q1 2016 (a decrease from the 200,000 panels shipped in Q4 2015).

OLED adoption in smartphones increased by 62.8% compared to Q1 2015. The increase in OLED shipments to smartphones were mostly due to new (most Chinese) smartphone makers using OLED displays. SDC is still the clear OLED leader, with a market share of 97.7%. LGD follows with 0.9% and AUO with 0.7%.

IGNIS Innovation announced that it has signed a non-exclusive patent license agreement with LG Display. Ignis will provide LGD with access to its circuit technology to enhance the performance of OLED displays.

CSOT 5.5-inch MaxLife AMOLED prototype

Ignis Innovation developed several OLED circuit technologies. It's basic technology involves OLED compensation, both external and internal - which can improve the power consumption and lifetime of OLED displays. The technology should also increase production yields and enhance the picture uniformity and stability.

Foxconn's $3.5 billion Sharp Takeover is underway and several reports suggested that Foxconn aims to invest a total of $1.8 billion in OLED technologies, as Foxconn aims to become an OLED supplier to Apple.

Most analysts estimated that Sharp won't be able to start producing OLEDs until at least 2018, but Foxconn's Chairman Terry Gou now says that Sharp aims to start shipping OLEDs as early as 2017.

LG Electronics USA announced that it is now offering OLED TVs designed specifically for hotel rooms. LG will offer its 4K 55" and 65" OLEDs that offers the "very best picture quality available" for luxury hotel rooms and public spaces.

LG's hotel-bound TVs feature the Pro:Idiom® digital rights management system, LG's Pro:Centric® interactive TV platform, and embedded b-LAN capability. In addition to those TVs, LG is also offering its commercial OLEDs - the Dual-view Flat and Curved Tiling displays for signage in hotel lobbies, clubs, and other high-profile public areas.

In April 2016, Japan's Semiconductor Energy Laboratory (SEL) and Advanced Film Device announced they have developed a hybrid OLED - reflective LCD display, that can switch between an OLED mode (for dark environments) and reflective LCD mode (for sunlight visibility). Such a display could be very power efficient.

TR-Hybrid in OLED mode

SEL demonstrated a prototype display at SID 2016, and provided more information. SEL calls these displays TR-Hybrid displays (TR means Transmissive OLED and Reflective LC). To create this display, SEL introduced holes into the reflecting electrodes of a reflective LCD, and the OLED layer beneath transmitted light through these holes in OLED mode.

Rumors of an upcoming OLED iPhone are nothing new - in fact it seems rather certain that Apple will use OLEDs in future iPhones - perhaps as early as next year. A developer discovered a new "Dark Mode" setting in the iOS 10 simulator.

In this mode, the settings application has a dark background and white text. According to 9to5Mac, this feature is a "hugely-requested" user feature - but it will also be very useful in an OLED iPhone as it will require much less power compared to a white UI.