Substrate - Page 11

Using plastic instead of glass substrates enables panel manufacturers to create bendable, flexible LCDs for mobile and consumer electronics applications. Samsung claims it has created the largest flexible display to date: The 7-inch prototype achieves VGA resolution.

On the performance side, the display 640 x 480 pixel resolution (VGA) at 114 ppi, which is in line with other types of bendable displays. The aperture ratio of the device is rated at 40 percent, the brightness at 100 nits and the color saturation at 60 percent. Samsung claims that the specs are sufficient to make plastic substrates a viable alternative to glass substrates even for digital TVs.
Flexibility is considered to be the next major step for LCD technology. Used already in Japan in the advertising industry, bendable screens are typically based on OLED variants. For example, Fujitsu recently announced an OLED-based "electronic paper," that includes non-volatile image memory, which can store and display a static color image without power supply.

Universal Display Furthers 'Flexible OLED Initiative' and Expands Prototype Capacity with Full-Color OLED Deposition System for OLED Displays on Plastic, Metallic Foil, and Glass Substrates.

UDC today announced the successful installation and start-up of a novel full-color OLED deposition system at Universal Display's technology development center in Ewing, New Jersey. Designed and built by Tokki Corporation, a leading supplier of OLED manufacturing equipment, working with Hitachi High-Technologies Corporation, a premier Japanese trading company, and using novel features designed by Tokki and Universal Display, the ELVES020C OLED Deposition System can produce OLED displays on both rigid glass and flexible substrates (e.g. metallic foil, and plastic).

This new system is the latest step in Universal Display's program to develop a broad array of technologies for conformable and flexible, full-color, high-resolution OLED displays. Universal Display was recently awarded a new $1.7 million Federal contract to develop flexible OLED display prototypes, bringing the Company's overall funded flexible OLED initiative to $6 million total.

MicroContinuum Inc. and Next Sierra have both been awarded contracts each totaling nearly $1 million by the U.S. Display Consortium (USDC) for advanced display process and component development.
MicroContinuum Inc. was awarded a contact to develop a process to pattern conductors on flexible substrates utilizing its roll-to-roll processing technology. MicroContinuum will use the process to form patterns in indium tin oxide (ITO), an optically transparent, conductive material used in display manufacturing.

Next Sierra will use the USDC contract to design and develop two versions of an integrated circuit for AM-OLEDs.

Cambridge Display Technology (CDT) and Add-Vision Inc (AVI), a pioneering developer of technology for low information content displays, have announced a business collaboration in which CDT will give AVI a paid-up license to certain CDT IP for specialized low resolution display applications. CDT will also join the existing private equity investors in a new round of funding to allow AVI to develop the technology more rapidly. In return for the license and equity investment, CDT will acquire a very substantial minority position in AVI.

The Add-Vision approach, developed over the last ten years, allows simple PLED displays and backlights to be fabricated by fast screen printing on plastic substrates without the need for expensive clean room facilities. As a result, the cost of display production can be kept lower, while maximizing throughput volumes.

Vitex Systems announced that it has been awarded an R&D contract from the U.S. Display Consortium (USDC) to scale up its flexible glass substrate technology to roll-type manufacturing for producing flexible OLED displays.

Vitex has developed a thin-film encapsulation solution, called Barix, to resolve moisture and oxygen sensitivity problems common in flexible substrates. Under this new USDC contract, Vitex will explore producing the flexible glass substrate on a high-volume, roll-to-roll manufacturing line with the improved barrier performance and lower defect levels needed to meet stringent quality requirements associated with producing OLED displays.