Universal Display Corporation (UDC) - Page 20

Researchers from the Fontys University in The Netherlands have demonstrated that patterned plasma treatment of substrates gives them better control over inkjet printed structures (which results in higher quality printing).

The researches have used tailored wettability using InnoPhysics uPlasmaPrint technology that can locally change surfaces from hydrophilic to hydrophobic and vice-versa, creating patterns that make droplets spread in only one direction while restraining them in the other direction. Printed lines created in this way have both a very high homogeneity and a well-controlled width (without this technology the inkjet spreads in all directions which creates broader lines). In the research they used PixDro's LP-50 R&D inkjet printing platform.

Google's Motorola announced two new smartphones today, both with OLED displays. The first is the Droid RAZR HD, an Android V4 smartphone with a large 4.7" 720p HD Super AMOLED display, a 1.5Ghz CPU, 8mp camera, 16GB of memory, NFC and a large 2,500mAh battery. There's also a Maxx version which has more memory (32GB) and a larger battery (and a slightly larger size of course). The Droid RAZR HD will launch towards the end of 2012.

The second phone is the RAZR M, an LTE smartphone that features a 4.3" qHD (960x540) Super AMOLED Advanced display, Gorilla Glass, dual-core CPU, 1GB RAM, 8mp camera and 8GM of storage memory (and a microSD slot). The RAZR M will ship in September 2012 for $99 on Verizon.

Universal Display reported their financial results for Q2 2012, with a record revenues of $30 million (up 167% compared to 2Q 2011). This includes the $15 million license payment from Samsung (paid twice a year). Net income was $11 million. UDC says that the number of customers purchasing OLED materials increased about 40% from 2Q 2011. Following are some notes from the conference call (during which Steve Abramson, UDC's president and CEO, mentioned OLED-Info four times):

Fujiflim's OLED IP acquisition

Regarding the recent $105 million purchase of Fujifilm's OLED IP portfolio, UDC says that half of these patents relate to device architecture, and the rest covers OLED materials - host, transport and phosphorescent emitters (including iridium and platinum). The company does not expect the patent purchase to generate revenue (in license or material sales) in the near term.

Universal Display announced that it is buying Fujifilm's entire worldwide OLED patent portfolio - over 1,200 OLED patents and patent applications for $105 million. UDC will not only strengthen its existing OLED patent portfolio, but will also "explore new and exciting areas of OLED materials and product development for the future". Fujifilm will supply their highly functional materials (barrier films, conductive films, flexible substrates and more) to OLED makers. In the future the two companies intend to strengthen and enhance this alliance.

Fujifilm has been involved with OLED R&D for over 10 years, and have developed "promising new technologies in OLED materials as well as devices using such materials". We don't have a lot of information about those patents, besides the fact that they revolve around Platinum based phosphorescent OLEDs, blue phosphorescent materials and device structures.

Toshiba held an R&D open house at its Tokyo Headquarters, showing up a few future projects. One of them is OLED lighting. Toshiba unveiled prototype panels that are very efficient at 91 lm/W (@1000 cd/m2). Toshiba hopes to start selling their OLED lighting panels by early 2015.

Back in 2010 it was reported that Toshiba (or TMDisplay, really) is scrapping plans for OLED displays, but will continue to do R&D in OLED lighting manufacturing equipment. In May 2011 Toshiba produced 100 OLED based portable lamps and distributed them to quake-hit areas in Japan. Toshiba produced those panels, and Universal Display donated OLED materials and technology for those lamps. It's highly likely that Toshiba is using phosphorescent materials in their new lamp (getting to 91 lm/W with a fluorescent-only design is highly unlikely).

Universal Display have entered into a three-year strategic alliance with Plextronics to develop and commercialize soluble OLED material systems. The new OLED systems will use combine Plextronics' HIL and HTL materials with UDC's PHOLED emissive materials. UDC also made a $4 million investment in Plextronics.

UDC and Plextronics were already collaborating before. Back in November 2010 Plextronics said that UDC's P2OLED system uses their HIL materials and OC NQ Ink.

Lumiotec announced new "natural white" OLED lighting panels (P06 panels) that feature the world's highest color rendering index (Ra93*1, a CRI of over 90). This is very close to natural light, and Lumiotec targets high-end retailers and museums. The panels come in five different sizes (up to 14.5x14.5 cm in size) and cost between ¥13,000 ($165) and ¥40,000 ($508).

The panels feature an efficiency of 28 lm/W, and Lumiotec told us that they use a hybrid design, comprising of both fluorescent and phosphorescent materials (provided by UDC). We do not know what is the exact mix. Lumiotec signed their license agreement with UDC back in April, and are already producing pure-phosphorescent panels, the P5, which feature 40 lm/W.

Konica Minolta announced that the OLED-010K OLED sample kits they have been offering since October 2011 are now discontinued, and they are offering OLED sample panel sets instead. The new sample panel set includes 5 OLED panels (and does not include a driver box and an AC adapter like the sample kits).

The new sample panel set costs ¥100,000 (about $1,250), and is now shipping. You can order it here.

Just before SID, the Flexible Display Center (FDC) at Arizona State University (ASU) announced that they managed to fabricate the world's largest (7.4") flexible (bendable) OLED using Mixed-Oxide TFTs. Those MO-TFTs deliver high performance (fast switching speeds and reduced power consumption), are quite cost-effective and can be produced on existing a-Si production lines. The FDC demonstrated this panel at SID.

This OLED panel was developed with funding from the US Army features 480x360 (81 ppi) resolution, has an Oxide-TFT (IGZO) backplane and is built on a PEN (polyethylene naphthalate) substrate. It was developed in collaboration with Universal Display, DuPont (Teijin film), Sunic and Henkel.

Universal Display and L-3 Display Systems have delivered an unbreakable plastic-based knee-mounted AMOLED display system prototype to the US Air Force. The project aims to build an ejection-safe electronic flight bag system designed to replace the paper maps and checklists traditionally held on the pilot’s knee.

The display (which uses UDC's PHOLED materials) is 4.3" in size and features 480x320 resolution on a plastic substrate system. This is the third product design that UDC and L-3 has developed. Back in October 2010, together with LG they delivered 8 flexible wrist-worn prototypes (also 4.3" but with lower resolution: 320x240). Interestingly, back in 2009 UDC was awarded $750,000 to develop an ejection-safe display for the US Air Force, but back then the project called for a 6" display.