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.
According to Japan's Nikkey, Apple's target is to adopt OLEDs by 2018. This is certainly enough time for Samsung Display, LG Display and perhaps JOLED or other display makers to get ready and make the investments required to have the capacity ready for Apple.
I do not know if these reports are true... but as OLEDs are becoming better and better than LCDs, and as flexible OLEDs are entering the market and changing the design options for mobile phones, it's highly likely that Apple will have no choice but to switch to OLED eventually. It also makes sense for Apple to start talking to suppliers years in advance as this undertaking means an investment of billions in production capacity.
In this round of rumors, there seems to be at least one early (if temporary) winner - Universal Display and the company's investors - UDC's share price rose sharply in the past few days, reportedly due to those latest Apple reports.
