OLED-TV Display/Monitor Technology News

A very good reuters article about OLED and bi-stable technologies.
An OLED screen uses as much as 40 percent less power than a comparable LCD and could be twice as thin because it does not need backlighting.

These technologies are already being used in some smaller portable devices, such as music players from Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. and Reigncom Ltd. and a thin mobile phone from Kyocera.

And Sony Corp. plans to sell small-sized TVs using the OLED technology later this year.

"In hand-held devices, display consumes power most. It's all about power and then maybe brightness," said Lehman Brothers analyst James Kim in South Korea.

Analysts reckon Apple's iPhone, which launched in the United States on Friday, may end up using more energy-efficient screens, such as OLED, given the short battery life of its pilot models with LCD screens.

"It makes sense (for Apple) to move to OLED screens. They are working to improve the battery issue," said Kim Woon-ho, an analyst at Prudential Investment & Securities.

"OLED makers have some expectations for Apple's switch, too, although there's no firm plan yet."
The commercial for these new display types has caught the eye of some LCD makers, like Samsung SDI Co. and Sony, given that LCD prices have plunged by a third in the last year.

Samsung SDI is already making OLED screens, while Taiwan's Chi Mei EL Corp. (CMEL) -- an pure OLED maker owned by LCD company Chi Mei Optoelectronics Corp. -- is running at full capacity.

The market for low-power forms of OLED and low power LCD displays is set to grow rapidly, reaching $24 billion in sales by 2012, rising at an annual growth rate of 27 percent from $6 billion in 2007, according to market researcher iSuppli Corp.
full article reuters