Flexible OLED

Researchers at Korea's Gachon University, in collaboration with InnoQD and researchers from Chungbuk National University, have developed a new QD-OLED patch that can encourage hair growth. The patch can also measure heart rate at the same time.

The researchers used a flexible OLED device, and covered it with quantum dots that emit near-infrared (NIR) light. The OLED device is a tandem blue OLED device, that offers a high light output. The researchers say that when attached to the head, the patch encourages hair collicle cell growth, with a measured improvement of 23% in hair growth.

US-based Ares Materials announced that it Japan's Denka invested in the company, with an aim to expand its high-functional materials business. Denka invested via its corporate VC that is jointly managed with Pegasus Tech Ventures.

Ares Materials developed a design technique that utilizes materials informatics (AI) for using enethiols as a raw material and possesses the technology to produce high-performance optical films using the design technique. The company says its optical films offer high performance, low cost and a reduced environmental impact.

A few months ago Inuru started shipping its range of OLED-powered stickers, or "holo tags" as the company refers to them. These are battery-powered flexible stickers that can be used for laptops or any other use.

The company was kind enough to send us three stickers, from their latest Cyberpunk range. These stickers cost around 20 Euros, and there are many alternative designs. The idea is that the flexible stickers include a small OLED, a battery and a button that lights up the OLED for a few seconds. The whole device is said to be waterproof, but I did not test it.

Inuru says that the lifetime of the OLED is about 5,000 hours. As the battery is limited, though, they say that each sticker is limited at around 2,500 clicks. Some of them use a red OLED, and some a blue one.

BOE Technology Group and Canada-based Omniply Technologies announced a co-development agreement, with an aim to develop new materials and process technologies for display manufacturing.

It turns out that the two companies have been working together for almost 2 years, hoping to bring Omniply's technology into BOE's next-generation flexible OLED fab. BOE hopes that Omniply's technology may enable lower cost production of OLED displays, and the production of more eco-friendly displays. It also has the potential to be used in flexible sensors and microLED products in the future.

According to a report from Korea, Samsung is progressing with its rollable OLED development project, and the company aims to launch its first rollable smartphone in 2025. When fully opened, the phone will sport a very large 12.4" display. Interestingly, Samsung apparently will implement an under-the-display camera solution.

Samsung's acceleration of its rollable phone project is seen as the Korean device maker's response to Huawei's tri-folding smartphone, the Mate XT. It is seen that this was an embarrassment for Samsung, that recently also to witness LG Display's leading over it with tandem OLED production. It will remain to be seen whether Samsung's acceleration will lead to problems in quality and reliability - which happened when it launched the world's first foldable phone back in 2019.

Researchers from Korea's KAIST, in collaboration with Dong-a University and ETRI have developed a new stretchable OLED structure that is made from 3D rigid islands, or bumps. These so-called 3D-Pop islands remain unchanged as the display itself stretches and so maintain excellent performance.

The OLED islands are connected with parts that are curved in shape (similar to a horseshoe) that can be deformed while still operating normally, even at 500% tension. The whole structure can simultaneously utilize hinge-type rotation and tension of the bending connection connector, and is so not limited to a 2D plane. Even at 40% elasticity, the light emitting area remains at 85%. 

Yesterday Apple announced its 2024 iPhone 16 series, and its latest smartwatch devices - all based on OLED displays. We'll start with the the iPhone 16 that offers a 6.1" 2,000 nits (HBM) 1179x2556 Super Retina XDR LTPS AMOLED, while the iPhone 16 Plus offers a larger 6.7" 1290x2796 display. Both phones are based on Apple's latest 3nm A18 chipset offering improved performance and AI support.

The iPhone 16 Pro has a more advanced 6.3" 120Hz 2,000 nits (HBM) 1206x2622 LTPO Super Retina XDR OLED. The 16 Pro Max offers a larger 6.9" 1320x2868 AMOLED. These new phones are based on Apple's 3 nm A18 Pro chip, offer a "huge leap in battery life", support Apple Intelligence and feature new a main camera.

Huawei officially announces the world's first tri-folding OLED smartphone, the Mate XT. The phone and its specifications will be unveiled on September 10, and will ship on September 20.

Huawei allows people to reserve their Mate XT phone, and already over 1.25 million people reserved it. 

Towards the end of 2023, BOE officially announced its plans for a 8.6-Gen flexible LTPO AMOLED line in Chengdu. The agreement with Chengdu's local government was signed in early 2024, and in April BOE announced it is starting to construct the new fab.

Last month China-based Voyah announced a new international all-electric SUV called the Zhiyin, that includes several innovative technologies. The taillights of the car are OLED lighting based, with 33 individually controlled OLED units on both the upper and lower sections, creating unique light patterns. We assumed that Yeolight is the OLED panel supplier, and indeed now the company confirmed that.

In addition to the OLED taillights, the Zhiyin will also an AMOLED display - a "curved sliding screen" that can "slide to accommodate different user needs". While this is not confirmed, we assume that this is a similar display to the one Hongqi just revealed yesterday - a sliding rollable 14.2" AMOLED panel produced by Visionox.