GE and Konica Minolta announced that they have achieved a "major breakthrough" in their white OLEDs: an efficient 56Lm/w flexible white OLED that is made using solution-coatable materials in a roll-to-roll printing process. The materials have "commercially viable lifetime" (we do not know exactly what they mean by that).
GE and Konica Minolta flexible desk lamp prototype
GE and Konica Minolta plan to introduce their flexible OLED lighting products next year (2011), and have already displayed some early prototype lamps (one of which is shown above). They are working together since 2007. KM hopes to see $1 billion in OLED Lighting sales by 2018. KM has licensed OLED IP from UDC.
Comments
Here's the original PR:
"We have produced high-performance white OLED lighting devices with a commercially viable lifetime using 'solution coating' rather than 'vacuum coating' processes. This allows us to make use of the high volume roll-to-roll manufacturing infrastructure that already has been perfected in the printing industry."
So the device was made using solution-coating materials. But it's not clear whether they were actually using roll-to-roll manufacturing...
Could you confirm that the 56 lm/W device was made using "solution coated" materials and not merely "solution coatable" materials, and that the device was indeed made by a roll-to-roll process?