Last month CSoT (TCL) announced plans to establish a 11-Gen LCD+OLED TV fab in Shenzhen, China. Details on the OLED part of that fab were not given, but now we have some updates following the company's investor day.

The new fab will use Oxide-TFT backplanes, and it turns out that the OLED part of the fab will also use the 11-Gen substrates (which may be cut for the actual OLED front plane deposition). Out of the entire capacity of 90,000 monthly substrates, the OLED line will use 20,000 substrates. The fab will start mass production in 2021.

Tianme had an large booth in SID, showcasing many display technologies and demonstrating its latest LCD and OLED panels. Tianma started producing rigid and flexible OLEDS in April 2017 at the company's 6-Gen fab in Wuhan, and at SID the company demonstrated its 5.5" on-cell rigid AMOLEDs now in production. Tianma told us that this display was adopted in smartphones by Lenovo and Asus.

Tianma also demonstrated several flexible OLEDs in many configurations which we will list below. Almost all of the panels were based on the same basic display - a flexible 5.99" WQHD 1440x2280 (537.5 PPI) AMOLED produced on a polyimide substrate. Tianma showed this panel in a regular design, and also in a notch-type design.

During its 2018 Investors Forum in Singapore, Samsung Electronics said that it expects the automotive display market to grow at a 9% CAGR from 2018 to 2022 - but automotive OLEDs will grow at a much faster rate - from 100,000 units in 2018 to 3 million in 2022.

At SID Displayweek Samsung indeed demonstrated many automotive OLED displays - including curved, rolllabe, unbreakable, transparent and lightfield AMOLED displays.

CLSA says that OLED penetration in the smartphone market was unchanged at 29% in Q1 2018 (up from 25% from Q1 2017, though). Unit shipments increased 12% from Q1 2017 to reach 96 million, but were down 15% from Q4 2017.

OLED adoption in Samsung Electronics' smartphones increased to 72% in Q1 2018, mostly due to the successful launch of the GS9. Apple saw a decrease from 35% in Q4 2017 to 32% in Q1 2018 as iPhone X shipment decreased.

Taiwan-based AU Optronics (AUO) demonstrated the company's latest OLED, LCD and Micro-LED technologies at SID 2018.

The company had a relatively small OLED demonstration area, showing its True-Circle in-cell Touch AMOLED displays (1.2" and 1.4") unveiled in May 2017. These displays are already shipping. AUO also unveiled its large 13" transparent AR AMOLED (68% transmittance). This transparent OLED was shown for the first time. The 13" panel features a resolution of 1150x575 (100 PPI) and a brightness of 200 nits.

In 2016 the EU launched the PI-SCALE project, which established a European-wide roll-to-roll flexible OLED lighting pilot production line, with an aim to enable companies of all sizes to quickly and cost effectively test and scale up their flexible OLED lighting concepts.

Now the EU has launched a €14 million initiative within PI-SCALE called LYTEUS, which provides the expertise and capability required to progress an OLED lighting concept from an idea and into a commercialized product. Lyteus helps companies with sheet-to-sheet and roll-to-roll prototyping of flexible OLEDs, technology transfer, device encapsulation and more. At launch Lyteus serves four customers: Audi, Rehau, Emde and Pilkington, to develop flexible OLED lighting products in the automotive, aeronautics and designer luminaires sectors.

Japan-based Futaba demonstrated its latest automotive, flexible and transparent PMOLEDs at SID 2018.

We did not see any new displays, but it was great to get an overview of the possible PMOLED solutions that Futaba offers to its target markets (mostly automotive and wearables).

Apple's 10th anniversary iPhone X is the company's first OLED Phone - with a 5.8" 1125x2436 (458 PPI) flexible Super AMOLED display that covers almost the entire front of the phone. The iPhone-X is difficult to repair and Apple charges $279 if your screen brakes outside of the warranty.

It is now reported that some companies in China are offering replacement screens for the iPhone X directly via eBay and other online retailers (note: affiliate link to eBay). Most of these screens cost more than the $279 Apple charges - and some of them are actually LCD displays and not OLEDs. These displays are thicker than the original, run hotter and also drain the battery faster. Some of these display also feature some serious defects...

China-based OLED producer Visionox had a very impressive booth at SID 2018, demonstrating the company's latest AMOLED and PMOLED displays and prototypes.

Visionox is now producing AMOLED displays for smartphones and wearables and the company showcased a wide range of AMOLED panels and also commercial phones that use these panels. Visionox also demonstrated many new display prototypes.

Samsung is aiming to launch its first foldable OLED phone by the end of 2018 or early 2019, but two months ago it was reported in Korea that Huawei aims to beat Samsung and announce its first foldable phone in November 2018, using LGD's OLEDs.

A new report from ETNews now says that Huawei is actually working with China-based BOE Display, and not LGD. The first Huawei phone will have a 8" display and it will fold into a smartphone-sized device. This report makes more sense than the LGD report, as it seems that BOE's foldable OLED technology is more advanced than LGD's - and in fact last week the company unveiled a 7.56" 2048x1535 foldable OLED.