Samsung recently re-launched its foldable OLED smartphone, the Galaxy Fold - and now the first reviews are coming in. CNet posted an interested video in which they put the Galaxy Fold to a folding cycles test, using a what seems to be an aggressive machine that folds and unfolds it quickly.

The Galaxy Fold lasted for 14 hours - or 120,000 folds. Samsung says its own tests show that the smartphone lasts for over 200,000 folds. So the CNet test falls short of that - but I have to say that CNet's machine seems rather more aggressive than a normal folding would be...

In August 2019 Audi announced a new OLED lighting technology, called Digital OLED, which uses multi-segment OLED taillight modules that can show signs and information - or just display new lighting designs. This is not a new idea, but it is interesting to see Audi's new take on it. Audi unveiled the technology at the ISAL19 trade-show:

The modules use 50 red OLED triangular panels that can be controlled like a dot-matrix display. The OLED panels were provided by OLEDWorks.

DSCC says that OLED panel unit shipments will reach 1.06 billion by 2023. The growth will peak in 2020 (with a 27% unit growth and 25% revenue growth from 2019). Overall revenues for OLED panels will grow from $26.5 billion in 2018 to $46.2 billion in 2023.

DSCC says that it lowered its OLED TV forecast for 2020-2023, as LGD is delaying both its Guangzhou 8.5-Gen fab ramp up and its P10 10.5-Gen line by one year. New LCD technologies, including dual-cell LCD and miniLEDs will also hurt the growth of the OLED TV market. DSCC further reports that LG Electronics will not be able to reach its 2 million OLED TV goal in 2019 - and have asked LGD to supply it with only 2.5 million OLED TV panels in 2020 (the original plan was to supply 3.5 million panels to LGE).

HP announced a new edition to its 13.3" Spectre x360 13 laptop - which comes with an optional 13.3" 4K AMOLED display. HP will start shipping the Spectre x360 13 OLED in October 2019.

This is the first time we hear of this new 13.3" 4K AMOLED display. In 2016 and 2017 Samsung produced 13" laptop OLED displays - but with a lower 2560x1440 resolution. This was used in an 2016 HP Spectre x360 13 laptop and also in some Alienware gaming laptops. In February 2019 Samsung started to produce 15.6" 4K AMOLEDs for laptops - and it's great to hear that it is now adding a smaller laptop display as well.

In July we reported that LG Electronics is in talks with China-based BOE to supply OLED panels for future smartphones, to replace LGE's current supplier - its sister company LG Display. A new report from Korea's ETNews confirms this, saying that LG Display is focusing on Apple as its future customers, and LGE's small shipments is not critical for the company.

ETNews also suggests that Samsung Electronics is in early talks with China's CSoT for flexible OLED supply for low-end and mid-tier smartphones. CSoT is not yet producing flexible OLEDs in volume - the company started pilot production in its Wuhan fab in May 2019.

Sharp demonstrated a flexible 12.3" 1920x720 AMOLED display for automotive applications. The displays uses an IGZO backplane, and Sharp says that it intends to use external compensation to improve the uniformity in the display.

Sharp demonstrated the display at the 2019 Vehicle Displays and Interfaces Symposium - at which apparently this was the only OLED on display. According to Display Daily's Ken Werner, OLED displays are finding it difficult to penetrate the automotive display market.