LTPS - Page 7

Taiwan has a large display industry, but in recent years it seems that it is lagging behind Korea, Japan and China in AMOLED technologies. We asked a local industry expert to check out the three main Taiwanese AMOLED companies (AUO, Innolux and RiTDisplay), and now we post on his updates.

AUO

As we reported already, AUO started producing AMOLEDs in their 4.5-Gen fab in Singapore after years of delays. According to our source, AUO is actually only producing samples. Those 5" 720p (295 ppi) panel samples have been been submitted to a company based in China. Earlier reports suggested AUO is going to supply HTC and Sony but it appears these two companies will keep using LCDs for now.

A few days ago Samsung held their Analyst Day 2013 with a lot of fascinating information regarding the company's present business and its future plans. It was clear from Samsung Display's presentation that the company sees OLED as the leading future display technology and puts a great emphasis on flexible displays. They see flexible OLED penetration into the mobile display market reaching 40% by 2018 (up from 0.2% in 2013) - this is based on research by DisplaySearch.

In fact Samsung Electronics's CEO announced that the company aims to bring fully-foldable screens sometimes in 2015. In the same statement he mentioned that there is still plenty of room for improvement for the Galaxy Gear and it's likely that the company is already developing a wearable device with a flexible AMOLED display.

Tianma has been developing AMOLED technologies for a long time, and in August 2010 have decided to build a pilot AMOLED production line (4.5-Gen) in Shanghai. This pilot fab is able to produce around 1,000 glass substrates in a month. I visited Tianma's booth at SID 2012 and saw their direct-emission AMOLED prototypes (3.2" 320x480 and 12.1" 1280x800) made on an LTPS backplane:

Today we learned some more about Tianma's OLED and LTPS program. The company's first step is indeed the pilot line in Shanghai. This pilot line produces 2,000 monthly LTPS substrates. The company uses half for LCD and half for OLED production. Total investment in this pilot line amounted to 500 million RMB (over $82 million USD).

Last week we reported that AUO finally started AMOLED mass production. Today AUO's president Paul Peng confirmed this report in an interview: "AUO has made progress in developing AMOLED and has begun volume production of small-size AMOLED panels".

AUO 4.4-inch AMOLED prototype

According to our information, AUO is mass producing AMOLEDs in their AFPD fab in Singapore. This is a Gen-4.5 LTPS fab that was converted for AMOLED production. The fab has a monthly capacity of 45,000 substrates (we're not sure if all lines were converted to OLED though).

According to our sources, AUO finally started AMOLED mass production in their AFPD subsidiary in Singapore. AFPD has a Gen-4.5 LTPS fab that was converted for AMOLED production. The fab has a monthly capacity of 45,000 substrates but it's not clear whether all the lines were converted to AMOLED and how many OLED panels are currently produced there.

AUO 4.4-inch AMOLED prototype

I'm not sure which panels are being produced there at the moment, but it's likely that AUO is producing the panels they have recently unveiled at trade shows - 4.4" 1900x600 (413 PPI) panel, 5" Full-HD (443 PPI) panel and their newest 5" HD720 AMOLED panels. Earlier reports suggested that HTC and Sony are waiting to integrate AUO's AMOLEDs in their mobile devices.

Applied Materials and Tokyo Electron (TEL) will merge into a new company that will have a market value of $29 billion. Applied shareholders will own approximately 68% of the new company and Tokyo Electron shareholders approximately 32%. The new company name is still unknown. Applied Materials is considered to be the world's leader in deposition and process control. According to Gartner, In 2012 Applied held 14.4% of the global semiconductor manufacturing equipment market and TEL had 11.1%.

Both companies are engaged with OLED manufacturing equipment. Applied Materials is offering two film deposition systems suitable for LTPS or Oxide-TFT backplane deposition (for both LCD and OLEDs panels). The AKT-PX-PECVD system (shown below) is sed to deposit LTPS films on large glass substrates (sized from 1.6 m² to 5.7 m²). The AKT-PiVoT PVD system is used to deposit metal oxide-based TFTs (IGZO in particular).

DisplaySearch says that OLED TV panels production costs are still very high, but this will not deter investments and the company forecasts rapid expansion in AMOLED capacity, as can be seen in the chart below (in which the yellow bars show AMOLED capacity while the green bar is capacity that can be used for either LCD or AMOLED production):

According to this chart dedicated AMOLED fab capacity grew from less than a million square meters in 2011 to almost four million square meters in 2013. In 2017, dedicated AMOLED capacity will reach 14 million square meters (i.e. 28 times as much capacity as in 2011).

Corning recently announced the new second-gen Lotus XT high-performance glass suitable for OLED displays. The company has been supplying glass substrate and cover glass for OLED displays for years now. Now Corning was kind enough to participate in a Q&A session here on OLED-Info to better explain how they see the OLED market and what the future holds for Corning and OLEDs.

We talked to two Corning executives. John Bayne is Corning's High Performance Displays VP and General Manager, while Harrison Smookler is the commercial director and program manager of Willow Glass Substrates (flexible glass).

Tianma selected Corning's Lotus XT Glass for its line of LTPS panels. Tianma is currently producing LCDs but will hopefully start AMOLED production in 2014.

Tianma says they chose Lotus XG Glass because of the advanced properties of the glass. The company’s LTPS line is located in Xiamen, China, and has a capacity of 30,000 TFT modules, and more than 30,000 color-filter modules per month. It is the first Gen 5.5 LTPS line in China.

EverDisplay Optronics is a new Chinese company (established in October 2012) that aims to become China's first AMOLED production facility. I was told that the company has acquired the investment required for this factory and have already began to purchase equipment and build the fab.

EverDisplay's fab will produce AMOLED displays based on LTPS substrate. Their plan is to start making samples by the summer of 2014, and mass production will begin by Q4 2014. The production capacity will be 15,000 monthly substrate and the focus is on small and medium size panels.