JOLED - Page 6

JOLED (Japan OLED) was established in August 2014 by Japan Display, Sony and Panasonic with an aim to become an OLED medium display (10-30 inch) producer. The company is aiming to start mass production in 2019, although some panels may ship in limited volume earlier.

Last week at Cebit 2017 JOLED demonstrated some of its latest OLED prototypes. In the photo above you can see JOLED's 21.6" 4K (3840x2160, 204 PPI) "medical applications" monitor. JOLED also demonstrated what seems to be the same panel for "consumer" application (they call this private viewing). The whole panel weighs just 500 grams and the color gamut is 130% sRGB.

JOLED (Japan OLED) was established in August 2014 by Japan Display, Sony and Panasonic with an aim to become an OLED medium display (10-30 inch) producer. JOLED is using a printing process which should result in lower cost production (but of lower performance displays) compared to evaporation printing.

JOLED's R&D Division Manager spoke at the PF&E China conference a couple of weeks ago, detailing the company's process. JOLED is producing RGB-strip OLED panels using ink-jet printers made by Panasonic and PLED materials produced by Sumitomo. The OLED structure is based on Sony's technology and the backplane is a transparent amorphous oxide semiconductor.

Last week we posted that Japan Display is set to raise its stake in JOLED for $100 million, following a $650 million USD cash injection from INCJ to grow its LCD and OLED business. JDI today confirmed this plan. The company received 45 billion yen ($382 million US) from INCJ in the form of unsecured subordinated convertible bonds and these funds will be used for R&D expenses on printing OLED technologies (and will probably include the $100 million for JOLED).

JDI also received 30 billion yen (about $255 million US) from INCJ in the form of subordinated loan, and this money will go towards OLED R&D in the field of evaporation OLED technologies.

JOLED (Japan OLED) was established in August 2014 by Japan Display (15%), Sony (5%) and Panasonic (5%) with an aim to become an OLED medium display producer using printing technologies. The Innovation Network Corp of Japan (INCJ), which funded JOLED, had a 75% stake.

In early 2016 it was reported that Japan Display (JDI) aims to acquire JOLED, and this deal is finally taking place - JDI will pay around $100 million USD to INCJ and will raise its stake to over 50% (which values JOLED at around $300 million). Reuters say that the financing transactions, though, will only end towards the end of 2017.

The Nikkei reports that JOLED aims to start producing prototype OLED panels in the second half of 2017. JOLED developed a 21.6" UHD panel and actually aims to start offering the panel in 2017 to medical monitor makers and other commercial applications.

JOLED is using a printing based process and it is estimated that production costs will be 30% to 40% lower than evaporation based processes - but the performance of soluble OLED materials are not yet up to par with evaporation materials. The panels are made on an Oxide-TFT backplane, and the process is optimized for 10 to 30 inch panels. JOLED expects to achieve mass production in FY2018 (April 2018 to March 2019).

JOLED's head of business development, Tomoaki Tsuboka, announced that the company developed two OLED panels, a 12.2" FHD (180 PPI) panel and a 19.3" 4K one (230 PPI) - made using printing technologies. JOLED aims to mass produce such panel in 2018.

Tomoaki updates that JOLED is preparing a Gen-4.5 fab to produce such OLEDs - probably using printing technologies. Reports from 2015 suggested that JOLED plans to invest $160 million in a new R&D and production facility - that will indeed commence production by 2018.

Last week we reported that Kyushu University spun-off a new company, called Kyulux, to commercialize the TADF emitters developed at Kyushu. Kyulux raised $13.5 million USD, and today the company made an official announcement - including the full investor list.

It turns out that besides LG Display, Kyulux lists Samsung Display, Japan Display and JOLED as investors. The round was led by Samsung Venture Investment Corporation and other participants include top tier Japanese venture capital funds, and a Japanese Government affiliated venture fund.

According to reports from Japan, JDI (Japan Display) wants to acquire JOLED. JOLED was launched in August 2014 by JDI itself together with Sony, Panasonic and the INCJ. JOLED is focused on medium-sized OLEDs for tablets and laptops, and reportedly aims to start pilot production in early 2017 and mass production towards the end of 2017.

According to the new report, JDI was interested in Sharp's LCD division, but Sharp finally decided to sell out to Foxconn (although that deal is not final yet). JOLED is JDI's second choice, and the Japanese companies aims to integrate their business by the of 2016.

Japan Display's research center chief, Akio Takimoto, says that JDI will begin producing OLED panels in 2018. JDI will take advantage of their advanced TFT technology as it aims to catch up with Samsung and LG.

JDI probably aims for 2018 following many reports that Apple aims to start adopting OLEDs in that year's iPhone models. Apple is reportedly already in talks with Samsung and LG as they need to secure a huge amount of production capacity - but it's likely that Apple will prefer teaming up with JDI over its Korean smartphone rivals.

In the past few weeks I have read dozens of stories regarding Apple and their display choice for future iPhones. Some reports say that they aim to adopt OLEDs in their future iPhones starting in 2017, some say Apple decided to remain with LCDs... One thing for sure - the 2016 iPhones will use an LCD and not an OLED.

One of the major reasons for that is that Apple sells around 200 million iPhones in a year - and there's simply not enough OLED production capacity for that. New reports from Japan say that Apple does want to switch to OLEDs - and is in talks with suppliers to secure the capacity and increase the lifetime and performance of OLEDs.