The Holst Centre is looking for researchers - about 20 of them (currently there are around 200 researchers), in fact, and many of those are for OLED related research. The Holst Centre was setup in 2005 by IMEC (Belgium) and TNO (Holland), with government support, and is located in Eindhoven.
You can find more information about the jobs, and application forms over at Holst's site.
Universal Display and Armstrong are showing their efficient white OLED lighting ceiling system. Each luminaire is built from four OLED panels, each 15cmX15cm (overall size is 15cmX60cm), mounted in outcoupling enhancement lenses. The demonstration lamp has four luminaries. Each panel offers 58 lumens per Watt (lm/W) which translates into a luminaire efficacy calculated to be 51 lm/W.
This lighting system has been developed with the help of the US Department of Energy (DOE) - which gave a $1.9 million grant in July 2008. Here's a short video that UDC released in July 2009 showing a prototype system:
Lumiotec started shipping their OLED Lighting kits back in February 2010. We were finally able to get our hands on one, and here's our hands-on review. We have already reviewed the Philips Lumiblade and the OSRAM ORBEOS panels, and we'll compare them all in this review.
Merck has opened their new material research center in Dramstadt, Germany. One of the activities performed in the MRC will be OLED material research and development. In fact, during the inauguration ceremony, Angela Merkel (the German Federal Chancellor) was informed about Merck's research areas, especially in the area of OLED Lighting.
Merck's OLED material development started in 2005 when they bought Covion. We know that Merck is focusing today on solution processable OLED materials, and hopes to have a solution-processable Green OLED ready soon.
STMicroelectronics has unveiled their latest power management chip aimed for AMOLED (and Super-AMOLED) display - the STOD03A. The new chip has an improved performance (compared to the STOD02). ST says that only six external components
are needed to complete the power-supply circuitry, making the STOD03A the most attractive for handset builders.
The STOD03A
uses highly efficient synchronous operation for both voltage outputs,
achieving up to 85% overall efficiency for longer overall battery life.
Other power-saving features include automatic pulse-skipping operation
for low power consumption at light loads, and a true shutdown mode
drawing less than one microamp activated through the enable pin (EN). ST
has achieved its high performance using its Silicon-On-Insulator (SOI)
technology as part of its latest-generation BCD fabrication process,
which enables analog, digital and closely spaced high-power circuitry to
be built on the same chip.
It turns out that Mitsubishi's Diamond Vision OLED displays (which go on sale today!) actually use PMOLED displays, and not AMOLEDs as we assumed. This is possible because each 'tile is only 128x128 in resolution. Using PMOLEDs allows Mitsubishi to make the displays cheaply (compared to AMOLEDs).
155-inch Diamond Vision OLEDThe OLED material used in the displays is small molecule, deposited by vacuum evaporation. The material was developed by Mitsubishi and Pioneer together. (the two companies are also collaborating on OLED lighting).
A few days ago Nokia has announced their ClearBlack-Display (or CBD) which is an AMOLED display that performs better outdoors. Today we learned that CBD means a polarized filter that sits on top of the display, and blocks light. This helps it perform better outdoors. So CBD is not the same as a Super-AMOLED display (which is an AMOLED with a touch-panel built-in).
In the photo above, you can see the Nokia's E7 (left) vs a Galaxy S with a Super-AMOLED.
The Holst Centre will cooperate with Coherent on flexible electronics. The Holst Centre will install a short-pulse (picosecond) laser source in the electronic foils processing equipment to be used for high-precision and low-defect laser ablation in sheet-to-sheet production of OLED and OPV devices.
The potential of the laser to comply with short processing times allows the transition towards roll-to-roll at a later stage in the collaboration which is important for low cost production. Coherent intends to take the results of the application and use it to expand its knowledge in flexible electronics manufacturing.
The US Department of Energy (DOE) has awarded three new OLED lighting small-business grants to Universal Display. The largest project is in Phase II already, and is focused on the development of ultra-high-efficiency phosphorescent OLEDs for lighting applications". UDC will produce a white OLED that features 120lm/W efficiency by improving out-coupling of light from the OLED structure through high-index substrates and low-voltage operation.
The second will focus on thermal management issues and optical improvements. UDC will make 15cm square panels with various designs, to see the thermal impacts of each. Lower temperature operation will help to extend the lifetime of the OLEDs.
Nokia has launched three new smartphones today, two of which (The E7 and the C6-01) use Nokia's new Clear Black Display (CBD) technology which is said to perform better outdoors than a normal AMOLED. Nokia says that the display is a polarized AMOLED. This might actually be just Nokia's name for a Samsung made Super-AMOLED display, we do not know yet.
Nokia E7
Engadget really likes the display: "The screen is simply gorgeous -- ClearBlack may be a gimmicky trademark, but CBD's black levels are no joke. We're definitely talking Super AMOLED degrees of awesome...".
