Power consumption - Page 19

Researchers from Kyushu University (led by Chihaya Adachi) developed a highly efficient blue OLED TADF (Thermally Activated Delayed Fluorescence) emitter that achieves almost 20% external quantum efficiency - similar to the best blue phosphorescent emitters.

TADF OLEDs are free from the heavy metals used in phosphorescent emitters and so they could be cheaper and better for the environment. The main problem with blue phosphorescent OLEDs is the short lifetime which still makes it impossible to use them in commercial applications. The new TADF blue OLEDs has about the same lifetime as the blue PHOLEDs, but researchers are hopeful that it will be easier to improve the lifetime of the TADF emitters.

Philips officially announced their latest OLED panel, the Lumiblade Brite FL300. This 12x12 cm (10x10 cm active area) new panel is very bright - up to 300 lumens. The FL300 is quite efficient (over 50 lm/W) and comes in either 3000K or 4000K.

This panel uses thin-film encapsulation and is only 1.4 mm thick. The lifetime is 10,000 hours (LT70) at full brightness and 50,000 hours at 125 lumens. The CRI is over 80.

Panasonic demonstrated three new OLED lighting panels at a LED trade show in Tokyo. First up is a flexible panel - this is the first time Panasonic demonstrated a flexible OLED. They did not reveal any specification - beside the fact that it is only 0.4 mm thick.

The second panel is a 10x10 cm panel that offers a luminous efficiency of 100 lm/W. Panasonic already unveiled a 114 lm/W panel back in 2013 - but it was a lot smaller (1x1 cm). According to Tech-On, the panel is not very bright and is also rather yellowish in color and they suspect that the CRI is low. Panasonic says that the emphasis has been on efficiency for this panel, and they wouldn't reveal specifications such as lifetime, CRI, color temperature, etc.

Konica Minolta developed the world's most efficient OLED lighting panel - at 131 lm/W. The panel's emitting area is 15 square centimeters. KM says that now OLEDs are actually more efficient than consumer LEDs, and this is a major step forward for OLED lighting. We do not know the lifetime or any other features of this panel.

KM's previous panel featured 103 lm/W and the company incorporated three new technologies in the new panel that enabled them to reach the record efficiency. First up is a new phosphorescent blue material that improved the internal quantum efficiency. In addition, KM also implemented a new light extraction technology and a new "organic layer construction technique", based on optical simulation.

The SID Display Week, the world's leading display industry showcase is scheduled for June, but the organizers already published the list of papers to be presented in this show. Hiding in this long list of technical achievements and research projects are some interesting new OLED developments. So here's some of the achievements to be announced during the show (at no particular order).

TCL's China Star Optoelectronics Technology (CSOT) managed to fabricate a 7" QVGA (320x240) flexible PMOLED display. The display uses a thin PEN substrate, processed at Gen-4.5. The company also proposes a design for a 14" QVGA PMOLED panel. CSOT also developed a 31" Full-HD AMOLED panel that uses a IGZO backplane. The 31" direct-emission panel was produced on a Gen-4.5 glass substrate using FMM.

I just got word from Philips that the company intends to soon launch their first own OLED luminaire for office and retail. Philips has high hopes for this luminaire.

The luminaire is modular, and each module will use four of the Philips newest OLED panels which will be unveiled at the Light + Building show in April. Philips says that this lamp will meet "lighting norms" for workplaces.

The OLED Association reports that OSRAM developed a new 70 lm/W OLED lighting panel that feature 3,000 cd/m² luminance. This panel will be released in 2014.

According to the report, Osram wants to reach 110 lm/W by 2016 and 125 lm/W by 2018. At that point (in 2018) OLEDs will be competitive with LEDs.

The LED Tech Talk show hosted Dietmar Thomas, Philips' OLED communication and brand manager (and also my personal friend). Philips talks about the company's current OLED lighting offering and their expectations for the near future.

Dietmar actually says that OLEDs are ready for the general lighting market - and by general lighting he means stuff like emergency exit signs, signage in general and under-the-shelf lighting. Philips also sees OLEDs enter the residential lighting market, but this will only happen in 2017 or so.

Alkilu is a new company (established in 2013 in California) that develops affordable consumer OLED lighting devices. The company unveiled their first products yetserday at the consumer electronics show.

Alkilu has a wide range of products planned - night lights, camping lights, bike lights, countdown timers, vanity mirrors and even a music conductor stand. They plan to release the first products in April or May 2014. Hopefully they'll pull that off as their prices are indeed affordable - the ladybug nightlife is only $39.95 for example, while the countdown timer will cost only $19.95.

New York Stat's Energy Research and Development Authority’s (NYSERDA) announced $4.8 million worth of grants for technologies that can enable more energy efficient buildings. There are 3 OLED related projects that were awarded $800,000 altogether.

OLEDWorks received $491,000 to improve the capability and control of its OLED manufacturing processes in order to manufacturing robust products at affordable cost. This is OLEDWorks' second grant from NYSERDA - in June the company was awarded $200,000 (in collaboration with WAC Lighting) to develop lighting for office space, combining LED indirect ambient device with an OLED "task unit".