Philips - Page 13

A few weeks ago, Philips sent me a couple of Lumiblade OLED panels to test - a blue square, and a white 'freeform'. Unfortunately the white one had some defects. So they sent me a new white panel, this one a square. It's the same size as the blue square. Finally I have a real OLED light lamp - a white one... The OLED driver that I have can only connect to one panel (when you actually buy these from Philips, you get a 4-panel driver. So I couldn't take a photo of two panels together.

The OLED100.eu project is a European 3-year OLED lighting project. The 30M$ project is a followup to the OLLA project, ended in June 2008, and it is lead by Philips, OSRAM, Siemens, Novaled and the Franhofer IPMS.

Dr. Stefan Grabowsky, the project's manager has been kind enough to talk to us, answer a few questions and give us more info on the project. Dr. Stefan has a Ph.D in Physics,  from the University of Duisburg. In 2000 he joined Philips Research labs. He's working on OLEDs for several years now, with a focus on device physics and OLED stack development. Since September 2008 he is the project manager for OLED100.eu.

Q: Stefan, thanks for taking the time to do this interview. Can you tell us a bit about OLED100.eu?
OLED100.eu is an European integrated research project that has brought together a consortium of experts from leading industry and academic organizations to accelerate the development of organic light-emitting diode (OLED) technologies. It has received €12.5 million funding from the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme to form the technological basis for efficient OLED applications for the general lighting industry in Europe.

Large-area OLED from Philips

Update: Philips sent us a new white OLED square, here's our hands-on review of it

The kind folks from Philips have sent me a couple of OLED light panel samples to review. Philips have started to offer these panels online, but you can't actually get them yet. The kits are not ready, and the one I got was without a proper box and manuals. As this is just a lamp, really, it's pretty simple to use. You get a driver-box, that's got a dimmer and an on/off switch. I also got two panels:

• Small rectangle in blue color (Height 43.7mm, 47.4mm)
• White freeform (height 39.4mm, width 73.1mm)

The first thing you notice is how thin these panels are. It is amazing at first to have a light source so thin. After a while you get used to it, and now it seems strange that normal lamps have to be so big! Once these kind of lights are available, I'm sure no one will want to go back...

The freeform one has a lot of 'speckles' on it. It turns out that it got damaged in the shipment (or perhaps Israeli customs, who handled it and opened it, are to blame). Philips promised to send another white panel, so I'll be able to post new photos in a week or so. UPDATE: Philips indeed sent me a new, working white OLED square... 

Those panels have 1,000 cd/m2 brightness, are up to 20 lm/w in efficiency, and Philips say that the lifetime is 10,000 hours. They are also very thin - 1.8mm in fact. Here's how they look when lighted:

The panels are not very bright, and you need several of those panels to create a lamp. In fact when Philips showed their table lamp design, it had more then 10 panels. So if you're thinking of ordering those for a test, be sure to order enough.

We still can't get enough of Philips new OLED Lighting panels. DesignBoom is showing great new photos of the various OLED lamps and "wall" Philips were showing last week. Here are a couple of photos I really liked:

Philips ceiling OLED lamp

Philips standing OLED lamp

Philips have released a short video clip of their OLED Chandelier, which was unveiled yesterday:

Philips are showing new OLED lamp concepts in a show in Milan (where they also officially announce the Lumiblade OLED panels). There are four concepts on show: standing, wall-mounted, desk-top and ceiling. Some of the lamps are also using LEDs to supplement the OLEDs.  

Philips OLED table lamp concept
Philips OLED Chandelier concept

Philips are also showing OLED for large spaces (such as reception
areas). They show a "wall" that reacts to people closeby, creating a
reflection of their shadows... We do not have a photo of that one yet...

Philips has published several press releases today regarding OLEDs. They are already shipping samples of their OLED lighting panels, and hope to bring these to market in 2010. Philips are also discussing three new types of OLEDs.

The first is Color-Tunable OLEDs: in these kind of panels the user can change the color of the panel. This is a new idea, and they are already working on that. Philips excepts these in 3-5 years.

We know that Philips are also working on Transparent OLEDs, and now they say that these too might be available in 3-5 years.

Transparent OLEDs by Philips

Lastly, Philips are less optimistic about Flexible OLEDs - these might only appear in 5-8 years. Interestingly, more than transparent ones.

Philips are now offering the "Lumiblade Experience Kit" - you can order OLED lighting panels of different sizes to sample. There are different shapes (circles, triangles, rectangles, hexagons and some 'free-shapes' as Philips calls them).

Philips Lumiblade sample circle

Philips say they see OLED lighting as a way to use OLEDs in clothing, furniture, vehicles, jewelry, works of art and more - it's a kind of a 'building block' for designers to play with. And that's who they think will order the new samples - designers who wish to start and play with these cool new OLED lights...

Philips Lumiblade sample hexagonPhilips Lumiblade sample tulip

Prices are obviously quite high - the driver costs 70euro, and the panels range from around 70euro to over 500euro.

Philips have been shipping samples for quite some time, but this is the first time they are actually available to the 'public'. Their plan is to have real commercial products by 2010.

According to OLEDNet, Philips are getting ready to release OLED Lighting products by 2010 (which was announced a while back) and are talking with Korean companies to purchase manufacturing equipment.

OLEDNet has also published Philip's OLED Lighting roadmap:

Philips OLED lighting roadmap

Which shows that in the Future Philips will indeed attempt Flexible and Transparent lighting panels. Philips already showed some transparent OLED prototypes a few weeks ago.

Agfa, Philips and the Holst Center are showing a large-area (12x12cm2) flexible OLED - without ITO as transparent electrode, and with printed shunting lines. This means that costly materials and lithography processes are not needed, and the OLEDs are much cheaper.

Flexible OLED lighting prototype with no ITO

Up till now, ITO was needed as supporting layer for the PEDOT/PSS* anode layer with lower conductivity. Thanks to Agfa’s high-conductive transparent polymer OrgaconTM, a PEDOT/PSS-based solution with six orders better conductivity than its predecessor, the use of ITO can now be avoided. Proof is the latest OLED lighting demonstrator of Holst Centre’s shared programs: a homogeneous white OLED tile of 12x12cm2 without the use of ITO.