Universal Display Corporation (NASDAQ:PANL), a key innovator behind tomorrow’s displays and lighting through its PHOLED phosphorescent OLED technology, today announced that it has been awarded two new Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I grants totalling $200,000 from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to develop WOLED™ white OLED technology for future solid-state lighting applications.
The Company’s proprietary PHOLED phosphorescent OLED technology is widely recognized as a critical element for the development of highly-efficient white OLED lighting. In the first grant, Universal Display will work to develop white PHOLEDs with a stacked architecture. The stacked architecture will be based on the SOLED™ stacked OLED technology that was previously pioneered by Universal Display and its academic partner, Princeton University. In a SOLED, multiple OLEDs are stacked or built on top of one other, increasing the light emission from the device. As a result, white SOLEDs may offer power and stability advantages over standard structures.
The second grant also focuses on demonstrating white PHOLED performance advances. When the size of an OLED device is increased, or several OLED devices are connected together to make a panel, their performance is often reduced. In this specific program, Universal Display will address the technical issues that relate to demonstrating similar performance on a 6” x 6” WOLED lighting panel that has been previously demonstrated on a smaller scale. UDC recently announced a white PHOLED with a power efficiency of 45 lm/W at a luminance of 1,000 cd/m2.
“We are pleased to continue our work with the U.S. Department of Energy to demonstrate further advancements in our white OLED technology,” says Steven V. Abramson, Universal Display Corporation’s President and Chief Operating Officer. “As our nation continues to look for new ways to conserve energy, Universal Display’s high-efficiency PHOLED technology has the potential to play an important role in the development of energy-efficient white OLED lighting technology and ‘greener’ lighting products.”
Lighting accounts for over 8% of all the energy used in the United States, or about 22% of all the electricity produced. The cost to consumers amounts to almost $58 billion a year, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. OLED technology has been identified as a potential solution to provide more energy efficient, economical lighting. Universal Display’s PHOLED technology, which offers energy efficiencies that are up to four times higher than previously thought possible with OLEDs, is an important part of this solution. The Company’s two new grants represent further evidence of that potential and are targeted toward the DOE’s efficiency goal for white OLEDs, 150 lm/W at a brightness level of 1,000 cd/m2, by the year 2025.
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