Wearable OLEDs - Introduction and Latest Industry News - Page 12

In January 2017 Kopin unveiled its first OLED microdisplay, the 1-inch 120 Hz 2k x 2k Lightning panel, and in March 2017 Kopin announced that it is developing a VR headset in collaboration with Goertek - a mobile VR headset that uses the Lightning OLED microdisplay.

The two companies now unveiled their VR headset reference design, called the Elf VR. The Elf VR utilizes Kopin's Lightning OLED microdisplay to create a headset that is lighter, more efficient and with a higher image quality compared to the current VR headsets based on smartphone-sized OLEDs. The Elf VR adopts an advanced optical solution with a compact Multi-Lens design. The reference design supports two novel optics solutions 70 degrees FOV for film-like beauty or 100 degrees FOV for deep immersion.

AUO demonstrates several OLED panels and technologies at SID 2017, and the excellent video below walks through these displays with lot's of details.

First up is AUO's foldable 5" 1280x720 (295 PPI) high color gamut (95% BT.2020) display announced last month. JJ Lih, AUO's R&D manager, says that the company expects to have this display in mass production within 2 years. The panel is only 1 mm thick and the bending (folding) radius is 4 mm.

AU Optronics developed new round AMOLED displays, which they call True-Circle displays, which have slimmer salient corners compared to AUO's current round OLED displays. This enables watch designers more flexibility with their designs.

AUO is demonstrating two such displays, with a diameter of 1.2-inch and 1.4-inch. AUO aims to start mass producing these new displays in the second half of 2017. You can see how these displays look compared to AUO's current "Full Circle" displays.

According to reports from Taiwan, Asus may have decided to stop developing its ZenWatch line of smartwatches, due to poor market performance. The reports suggest that Asus managed to sell only about 5,000 to 6,000 watches each month.

Asus first ZenWatch was launched in 2014. The latest model, the ZenWatch 3, started shipping in November 2016 for $225. The ZenWatch 3 is an Android Wear smartwatch that features a 1.39" 400x400 (287 PPI) AMOLED display, a SnapDragon Wear 2100 CPU, 512MB of RAM and 4GB of storage.

AU Optronics says that nine fashion brands have adopted the company's 1.2" and 1.4" round AMOLED displays for future smartwatch products. AUO will begin shipping the displays to these products in Q2 2017 - with shipments expected to reach a million panels per quarter in the second half of 2017.

AUO started producing its 1.4" circular AMOLED display in 2015. The company already ships those to smartwatch makers in China. You can find out more information on AUO's round AMOLED here.

Our display supplier in China has just received a large quantity of AUO's square 1.63" 320x320 AMOLED displays (with the touch layer), following a cancelled project that had already bought these panels. Those AMOLEDs are now offered at less than half their normal cost.

The supplier has 4,000 units - and this may be a great opportunity to get these panels at a low cost - contact us for more details. These AMOLEDs have a MIPI DSI interface, a size of 32.08x36.48 mm (active area 29.28 x 29.29 mm) and a thickness of 0.7 mm.

Taiwan's AU Optronics starts shipping a new AMOLED display for wearable (and other) applications. The new AMOLED is a square 1.3" (active area 23.28x23.28 mm) panel with a resolution of 240x240 (261 PPI).

A few days ago we reported that AUO has reportedly managed to increase its AMOLED production yields, and the company is now indeed launching new AMOLED displays and resumes production of smartphone-sized AMOLEDs.

Solomon Systech announced it financial results for 2016, and the Hong Kong based display IC maker reported strong growth of its PMOLED display drivers in 2016, following strong demand from the wearable market.

Solomon Systech also announced several new design wins for its PMOLED display drivers with "world-renowned brands of wearable health and fitness devices". In January 2017 the company shipped its millionth SSD1306 PMOLED driver, the best selling OLED driver ever. The SSD1306 has been introduced in 2008 and is (according to Solomon Systech) the de-facto PMOLED module design standard.

In January 2017 Kopin unveiled its first OLED microdisplay, the 1-inch 120 Hz 2k x 2k Lightning panel. Kopin now announced that the reaction to the Lightning OLED micro display was "overwhelming", with many experts in the VR space commenting that it was the most beautiful VR image they had seen.

Kopin also revealed that it is developing a VR headset in collaboration with Goertek - a mobile VR headset that uses the Lightning OLED microdisplay.

LG announced that it is developing a new VR headset that is powered by Valve's StreamVR tracking. LG demonstrated a prototype at the Game Developers Conference and revealed the specification of the device.

LG's VR headset uses dual 3.64" 1440x1280 (529 PPI) 90Hz OLED displays, produced by LG Display (which means that these are probably flexible OLEDs produced on plastic substrates). The headset provides a 110-degrees field of view, and LG is ready to make development kits later this month and will ship them to select partners.