Last month during the Plastic Electronics 2012 conference Fraunhofer's COMEDD showed some interesting new OLED lighting prototypes. The most interesting prototype was an LCD display with OLED as a backlight unit (BLU).
This system is modular (made from small OLED panels tiled together), and because OLEDs do not require reflector and fiber optics it is much simple than LED or CCFL based LCDs. The OLED lighting panels also create a very comfortable and homogeneous light. OLED BLU units were discussed a few years ago, but they don't actually make a lot of sense. Currently OLED lighting panels are very expensive, but when prices drop, so will the prices of OLED displays...
The OLEDs in the prototype on display was developed together with BMG MIS (this was part of the So-Light project). The prototype was built from three OLED modules (each 300x100 mm in size). The installation depth is just 30 mm and the pixel brightness achieved is 350 cd/m2. In the future the installation depth can be lowered to less than 10 mm.
Other prototypes on display was a nice make-up mirror with an OLED lighting stripe around it and a flower-like animated OLED lighting installation.
