flexible OLED display

LG Display Co., just announced it will spend $907 million over the next two years to build a new factory for OLED (flexible organic light-emitting diode) displays.

Image credit LG

The decision was made because the South Korea display company chooses the flexible OLED as its next-generation display, for a wide use in smaller smart devices such as smartphones, smartwatches and vehicle dashboards.

LG Display Co and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd are the only firms worldwide, capable of mass-producing OLED screens.

according to The Telegraph:

“The new line will produce more than 200 cuts 5.5-inch cuts from a single plastic substrate sheet – the same size as an iPhone 6 Plus display.”

From the press release:

The new E5 Line is located at the Gumi Plant in Gyeongbuk Province, Korea, which will produce 7,500 input sheets per month using a 6th Generation size substrate sheet of 1,500mm x 1,850mm. The new line is scheduled to start mass production in the first half of 2017.

The 6th Generation line is able to produce more than 200 cuts of a 5.5-inch product from a single substrate, which is nearly four times the production efficiency of a conventional 4.5th Generation line, which uses 730mm x 920mm substrate sheets.

LG Display’s investment will help pioneer future display technologies such as foldable displays and large-size auto displays. The main advantage of a flexible OLED display is the screen’s bending feature that is achieved by the use of a plastic substrate instead of a glass substrate as in a conventional OLED display. The use of the flexible OLED technology is now being expanded to smartphone, automotive and wearable device displays.

LG Display not only is creating differentiated competitiveness in the mobile display market by offering more design formats only possible through the flexible OLED, but is laying the foundation for the growth of flexible OLED displays by establishing a full-scale 6th Generation production plant that produces large sized panels.

via wsj

source LG