OLED microdisplay maker eMagin reported its financial results for Q1 2018 - revenues reached $6.9 million (up 13% from Q1 2017) and the net loss was $2.1 million (up slightly from $2.1 million in Q1 20170. At the end of the quarter, eMagin had $9.8 million in cash and equivalents.

eMagin says that it experiences a "notable upswing" in its business with a 20% increase in its backlog to $11.8 million from the end of 2017.

Visionox showcased it latest flexible OLEDs in a recent tradeshow, and Notebook Italia published this interesting video showing all of Visionox's displays.

Visionox is showing several interesting displays - a 5.99" 1080x2160 (403 PPI) AMOLED edge type flexible OLED, a full-screen 5.99" 2160×1440 flexible AMOLED and a 6.21" notch-type 2160×1440 AMOLED, with a touch sensor under the screen.

UBI Research says that foldable OLED display production will begin in 2019, and will quickly grow to over 28 million units shipped in 2022. The growth will be fast - but in total UBI sees the market remaining relatively small even at 2022, with most OLEDs on the marketing to remain flexible but not foldable.

UBI says that if OLED makers will be able to launch and commercialize foldable OLEDs, it could seriously disrupt the tablet PC market. The company expects the first foldable phone to use dual 5.2" displays (7.2" display when open) on the inside, with an additional small "bar-type" display when closed.

LG Electronics introduced its V30 smartphone in August 2017, the first LG phone in a long time that uses an OLED display (a 6-inch curved flexible 1440x2280 LGD pOLED). It was assumed that LG will start adopting OLEDs in more of its smartphones going forward, but LG's latest G7 ThinQ uses an LCD and not an OLED.

LG says that it will only use OLED displays in its V series of "innovative" smartphones - the rest of LG's smartphone will continue to use LCDs. It may be that LGD does not simply have the capacity for more OLED smartphone displays - especially if it aims to supply Apple in 2018.

Universal Display reported its financial results for Q1 2018. Revenues were $43.6 million, and net income was $6 million. These results were lower than the company expected, due to a slowdown in the premium smartphone market, the company's new accounting standard and the inventory pre-purchase the company reported in Q4 2017.

UDC is revising its 2018 guidance lower, to $280 million to $310 million. UDC expects the OLED market to remain week in the second quarter, but sees a pickup in OLED demand in the second half of 2018. In 2019, UDC expects significant growth to resume.

FlexEnable announced that Novares, a plastic automotive solutions provider, invested €5 million in the company. This is a strategic investment by Novares that aims to bring FlexEnable's flexible organic LCD (OLCD) to automotive interiors.

Interestingly the press release does not discuss OLEDs at all, only OLCDs which is described as a low-cost, high-reliability, conformable and shapeable display technology. FlexEnable started commercializing its OLCD technology together with Truly Semiconductors in 2017. OLCD production is expected to begin by the end of 2018, and Novares already demonstrated a demo Car that features OLCD displays

Ares Materials launched a new Mechanical Lift-Off (MLO) technology called Easybond that is designed to temporarily bond solution-cast flexible substrates to display mother glass during the OLED display fabrication process.

Ares says that Easybond offers a cost-effective reliable alternative to current last-based lift-off (LLO) processes. Using Easybond, OLED makers can also increase manufacturing throughput. The company says this solution can decrease flexible OLED production yields, resulting from defects caused by the last lift-off process.

According to a ZDNet report, the LG OLED TVs at Incheon Airport, installed only a few months ago, suffer from serious permanent image-retention, or burn-in. You can see the artifact at the top part of the TV in the photo below:

According to ZDNet, LG installed 29 such OLED TVs at the airport lobby in addition to 40 more units at four of the airport's lounges. These were installed in January 2018, only four months ago. LG Electronics did not comment on this story.

MagnaChip announced that revenues from its OLED driver business increased 141% in Q1 2018 (compared to Q4 2017) - a higher growth than the company expected. Magnachip anticipates that total OLED growth in 2018 will also surpass its previous targets.

Magnachip secured 10 new OLED design wins in Q1 2018 from phone makers in China and elsewhere in Asia. Magnachip also announced that it launched its new 3^rd-generation 40-nm OLED display driver (DDIC) that supports edge-type displays, 21:9 and bezel-less displays and notch-type OLEDs. The new driver has already its first design-in at a leading smartphone maker