OLED has proved to be a disappointment, according to Paul Gray of analysts DisplaySearch, speaking at Sharp's recent Innovation Forum in
"OLED has been next year's technology for about ten years", said Gray, "it's still very small volume." By that he means under half a billion dollars annually.
"OLED was the great hope around 2005. 2006 was described as the 'Year of the OLED' and a lot of money was invested", said Gray.
"Companies built fabs and looked for customers and won designs in MP3 players", added Gray, "but almost all had yield or manufacturing problems, and it took out a few MP3 players and some OLED manufacturers went bust."
Nor are the issues resolved: "There are a lot of problems which need to be sorted out in the display and in the drive electronics," added Gray.
Gray reckoned the market went from 70 million units in 2006, to 75 million units in 2007 and will be 95 million units in 2008 but will almost double to 180 million units in 2011, propelled by OLED TVs.
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