After years of promise will organic LED (OLED) display technology deliver with significant sales in consumer products such as smartphones?
This would make OLED the ideal display technology for mobile phones and so do manufacturers with market analyst IHS iSuppli predicting a six-fold jump in revenues from active matrix OLEDs in the next five years.
There is one small problem. OLED displays are more expensive to manufacture, have brightness issues and are still less reliable than traditional TFT LCDs.
It seems the industry expects the size and weight benefits of OLEDs for mobile handsets to be such that big suppliers like Samsung will address the cost and performance issues.
The expectation is that this could happen as soon as this year when Samsung's new 5.5-generation (5.5G) AMOLED line is due to go into production.
"This will likely bring improved efficiency that will help produce active matrix OLEDs at an equivalent cost as LCDs," said IHS iSuppli.
My guess is the OLED suppliers will have to start showing some progress toward LCD cost and performance levels very soon or handset manufacturers may get bored with organic displays before they have been given a chance to shine.
