OLED Smartphones - introduction and industry news - Page 19

In November 2020 it was reported that BOE did not pass Apple's OLED quality test for the iPhone 12. Later it was suggested that BOE did manage to enter Apple's supply chain, although perhaps only for aftermarket (refurbished models) panels.

According to new reports from China and Korea, BOE has been finally approved as a third OLED supplier (besides Samsung Display and LG Display) for Apple's iPhone 12 - the mini and standard models (and not the higher-end iPhone 12 Pro).

Korea's The Elec says that it has learned that Samsung display is developing in-folding OLED displays for Google, Xiaomi and Oppo.

Xiaomi, who has in the past shown prototypes that use Visionox out-folding displays, is now aiming to adopt an SDC in-folding display - 8.03" in size. The Elec says that the same phone will use a large 6.38-inch external display, which will be produced by both SDC CSoT.

OLED driver IC developer MagnaChip announced that it has started to mass produce its first OLED driver ICs for 120Hz (HFR) QHD (1440 x 3360) smartphone flexible OLED displays.

Magnachip's new OLED DDICs were designed specifically for 5G smartphones that support high resolution and high refresh rates, and it is produced using the company's most advanced 28nm process technology.

Earlier this month we reported that China-based AMOLED producer EverDisplay (EDO) has become a public company. We have been a bit early, but the company is progressing on its IPO registration and has released some more information regarding is business.

The company is raising 10 billion Yuan ($1.5 billion USD) and most of these funds will be used to construct the company's new 6-Gen AMOLED line. As you can see in the image above, almost all the company's OLED panels are used in smartphones and wearables. But in 2020 the company also started to produce laptop and tablet displays - EDO recently started to make 11", 12.8" and 15.6" rigid and foldable AMOLED displays for laptop devices. We list many EDO OLED displays in the OLED Marketplace.

Samsung Display announced that its Galaxy S21 Ultra is the first device to adopt its updated M11 OLED material stack that uses new materials to increase the efficiency by 16%. Samsung now announced that its updated OLEDs has received the Sunlight Visibility verification from Underwriters Laboratories (UL).

UL’s test showed that the OLED panel scored 73% in DCI-P3 ambient color gamut and has peak brightness of 1,500 nits (compared to 1,300 nits achieved by Samsung's previous M10 OLED stack). Samsung Display says that its own internal testing show that color gamut in bright environment dropped from 99% to 73% , compared to a drop from 78% to 30% in competing LCD displays.

Last month Samsung Display announced that it has designed a new OLED stack (its M11 stack) that is 16% more efficient compared to its currently OLED stack. The first phone to adopt the new OLED materials will be the Galaxy S21 Ultra.

Anandtech posted an interesting and what seems to be comprehensive review of the Galaxy S21 Ultra display, comparing it to Samsung's previous generation panels. As you can see in the chart above, the results show that the new OLED stack is actually 26% to 31% more efficient when showing a full white screen. The brighter the display, the more efficient the new stack is compared to SDC's previous M10 OLED stack.

China-based OLED maker Visionox reported good preliminary financial results for 2020, with increased sales and improved revenues and profits. The company expects its net profit to be around 141-210 million Yuan ($21-31 million USD), which will represent an increase of 120-227% over 2019.

The company says that its ability to innovate OLED technologies (specially the world's first OLED with an under-the-screen camera and the world's first 144Hz refresh rate OLED) enabled the company to increase its customer base and in 2020 it has added OPPO and Motorola as customers.

Samsung Display confirmed that the company is developing rollable OLED displays, and that it will start mass producing such displays later in 2021. It is likely that the first customer for these displays will be Samsung Electronics.

Samsung has been developing rollable OLED technologies for many years, the demonstration above is from 2016. And of course it makes sense for Samsung to release these displays this year as other companies are already ahead of it - LG Electronics is set to release its first rollable smartphone in 2021 using BOE panels, and TCL/CSoT also recently demonstrated rollable OLEDs.

Samsung Electronics reported its Q4 2020 financial results, with revenues of $55 billion and net income of $5.84 billion (less than expected by analysts). The company says that the lower revenues were due to a weakness in the memory and consumer devices businesses, offset by the best quarter ever for Samsung Display.

Samsung expects its OLED business to improve in the next quarter as major customers increase adoption of OLED displays. Looking ahead to 2021, Samsung sees increased demand for OLEDs for high-end and mid-range smartphones. The company aims to diversify into markets such as laptops, tablets and automotive applications.

Germany-based trinamiX, a subsidiary of BASF, announced that it has developed an under-the-OLED 3D imaging sensor. This technology can enable high performance face authentication while working behind the display.

trinamiX's technology captures 2D images, 3D images and also performs what the company refers to as a "live skin" test that cannot be tricked by a full-face mask, a 2D image printout or even a 3D sculpture. The hardware consists of just a standard CMOS sensor and a near-infrared light projector.