Category Archives: FPDs and TFTs

May 31, 2012 — SouthWest NanoTechnologies (SWeNT) released SG65i, a single-wall carbon nanotube (SWCNT) product with >95% semiconducting concentration, before secondary processing to remove metallic SWCNT content.

SG65i, building on SWeNT’s grade SG65, was developed for use in printed semiconductor devices, such as thin-film transistors (TFT) in organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays, next-generation non-silicon semiconductor computing devices, and more.

SG65i is produced via the proprietary CoMoCAT process, which controls SWCNT structure, or chirality. Single-wall carbon nanotubes can be metallic or semiconducting, depending on diameter and chirality.

The >95% semiconducting content is approximately 28% more than most other SWCNTs, SWeNT reports. This high concentration avoids much slow, expensive, low-yielding secondary processing for semiconductor applications. Secondary processing to remove metallic SWCNTs can damage the remaining SWCNTs, SWeNT notes.

SG65i is available either as dry powder, aqueous or solvent based dispersions, or as printable ink.

SWeNT will continue improving processes to synthesize even more semiconductor-enriched products, with the goal of eliminating secondary processes altogether.

SouthWest NanoTechnologies (SWeNT) is an advanced materials company that manufactures high-quality single-wall and specialty multi-wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNT, MWCNT) products in various forms, including powders, pastes, dispersions and inks. For more information, please visit www.swentnano.com.

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May 31, 2012 — Ultrasonic Systems Inc. (USI), ultrasonic spray coating tool manufacturer, developed new options for its MAX-800 coating system, such as an automated reel-to-reel system, tablet-glass handling conveyor, and more.

The MAX-800 is a large-format (780mm2), high-speed X/Y/Z spray coating system using the company’s proprietary nozzle-less ultrasonic spray head technology for thin, uniform coatings. The optional active HEPA filtration system and vacuum-purged actuators ensure class-100-cleanroom-compatible conditions in the spray area. USI’s Precision Metering Pump liquid delivery system with servo motor control and automatic pump re-fill, delivers precise, repeatable liquid flow to the spray head. The tool is used to make displays, fuel cells, batteries, solar cells, and other devices.

New options for the system include application-specific-sized heated substrate fixture with vacuum hold, a heavy-duty conveyor for large substrates and pallets, an automated reel-to-reel (R2R) system for coating foil substrates, and a walking beam conveyor for transporting tablet-PC-sized glass plates.

Ultrasonic Systems, Inc. (USI) manufactures high-performance spray coating equipment based on patented, nozzle-less ultrasonic spray head technology. Learn more at http://www.ultraspray.com/.

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May 29, 2012 — Barclays Capital reports on liquid crystal display (LCD) demand and display fab equipment and materials at the company’s BarCap 2012 Global TMT Conference.

LCD TV sell-through trends remain mixed, with relative strength in the US, in-line in China, and weakness in Europe and Japan.

The top glassmakers for displays are seeing a stabilization in the competitive landscape/market share split, with limited progress from LG Chem. At the conference, Corning’s management was hopeful about continued moderate glass average selling price (ASP) declines through Q3 2012.

Capacity investments by the LCD panel makers remain at trough levels, despite relatively strong current utilization rates. Look for some equipment spending recovery in H2 2012, tempered by still very limited visibility. Display makers continue to funnel capex dollars into retrofitting fabs for low-temperature polysilicon (LTPS)/organic light emitting diode (OLED) display production.

Also read: Top 10 LCD manufacturing trends of 2012

Read more from Barclays Capital’s BarCap 2012 TMT conference in 90%+ utilization rates at LED makers in Taiwan: A short-term phenomenon

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May 28, 2012 — Transparent displays will hit the market this year, and create an $87.2 billion market by 2025, according to Displaybank.

The displays show a background through a degree of transparency in the display panel. They are made with transparent organic light emitting diode (OLEDs), liquid crystal displays (LCDs) and plasma display panel (PDP) technologies.

Transparent displays will help grow the overall display market size as they grow new display applications: windows, automobile panels, building-integrated advertising, etc. It offers huge opportunities for information sharing.

Figure. Display Market Forecast – Revenue Base ($B). SOURCE: Displaybank, Transparent Display Technology and Market Forecast.

Design and functional performance must be elevated to create transparent displays, which will have an effect on traditional displays as well.

Displaybank’s "Transparent Display Technology and Market Forecast" report addresses the industry trend and product feasibility in future applications through already launched transparent display products and also addresses trends in makers, technical issues, and the market forecast. Access “Transparent Display Technology and Market Forecast” at http://www.displaybank.com/_eng/research/report_view.html?id=768&cate=

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In an exclusive series of blogs, imec’s science writers report from the International Technology Forum (ITF) in Brussels. This year, ITF’s theme was “It’s a changing world. Let’s make a sustainable change together”. More info: www.itf2012.com

At the recent mobile world congress (MWC) the newest models of smartphones and tablets were showcased. Most probably, you too are the proud owner of a smartphone and tablet. The next big thing according to Charlotte Soens, manager mm-wave communication program at imec, is that people will start using these mobile devices to watch high-quality photos and videos, stored in the cloud. First smartphones with integrated projectors are appearing, so it won’t be long before we will project our holiday videos or professional marketing videos at home or in the office, using our smartphones.

However, this scenario implies huge technological challenges for services, networks and wireless devices. “Research focuses on enabling the scenario in which the user can access the gigabytes of photo and video material in an instantaneous way, wherever the user may be. Moreover, we have to achieve this at low cost and without significantly impacting the battery lifetime, “ says Charlotte Soens.

But let first focus on how this scenario will be put in practice. “Videos and photos are stored in the cloud. When you are outdoors, you will rely on wireless technology such as LTE advanced to stream videos immediatly to your tablet. When you go indoors, you will connect to a small domestic cell with a gigabit per second connection, through for example IEEE802.11ac or IEEE802.11ad,” explains Soens.

An important technology enabling this scenario is a multistandard radio. “You need a tablet or smartphone that can support e.g. LTE and WiFi-like standards. And that’s exactly what imec is working on: reconfigurable radio architectures that can support connectivity standards, cellular standards and broadcasting standards, “ says Soens. “The challenge is to do develop such a radio module with a low power consumption and at a low cost.”

The user will also demand for very high data rates. Knowing that the spectrum below 10GHz is really crowded, it seems obvious to turn to higher frequency bands such as the unlicensed band around 60GHz. However, developing a low-cost compact 60GHz radio for mobile consumer devices is a real technological challenge. “To achieve a low-cost solution, we work with digital CMOS. But it is very difficult to the good performance at mm-wave out of digital CMOS. Especially if you want to go for a low power consumption. It’s certainly not business as usual,” states Soens. But that it’s possible demonstrates the latest achievement of imec researchers: a 7Gbps 60GHz transceiver implemented in 40nm low-power digital CMOS targeting low-cost volume production.

Els Parton, Scientific editor imec

In an exclusive series of blogs, imec’s science writers report from the International Technology Forum (ITF) in Brussels. This year, ITF’s theme was “It’s a changing world. Let’s make a sustainable change together”.

What would our smart world be without displays? That was the question posed by imec’s Paul Heremans, Fellow and Director Large Area Electronics, in a presentation titled “Towards flexible active matrix OLED displays.” On a daily basis, we run our eyes over dozens of displays for various purposes, he said. And this number might increase if we look at the innovations that the display industry has in mind. No more newspapers or paper novels, but digital e-readers on mobile displays. No more paper posters for advertisement, but digital posters on large flexible screens. It’s time for a new era where OLED displays and flexible displays on plastic substrates enter the market and gradually replace cathode ray tubes and liquid crystal displays. They will enable a new wave of products and an increase of the display market size in general.

Meanwhile, the first commercial OLED displays have appeared in consumer products. So, how can an R&D centre such as imec and Holst Centre contribute to such a promising and fast evolving industry? Flexible OLED displays can be extensively adopted, e.g. in flexible posters for advertisement, as rollable TV screens, or, in smaller format,  as an e-reader or on a smart card. And all these applications come with very different specifications. Therefore, says Heremans, it’s important to focus on just one, or on a very few, applications. And they chose the mobile tablet display as the point of focus of their new technology integration program, launched by imec and Holst Centre at the beginning of 2012. The mobile tablet will gather all functionalities of a mobile phone, e-reader, digital camera, MP3 player, tablet pc, netbook… in just one device. The screen must be comfortable enough to be read and touched, and small, thin and flexible enough to be mobile. Such a display must be low power, low cost and high resolution. A humidity barrier, new thin-film transistor technology to drive the pixels, innovative technologies for patterning… the list of required innovations is impressive.

According to Heremans, the prospects are good. The researchers involved in the program can rely on 6 years of experience in the various building blocks, obtained from collaboration within Holst Centre. As a result, only one quarter after the launch of the program, they have realized the first integrated display. It’s not yet the targeted 300ppi OLED display, but it’s good enough to study the pixel engines and to understand what improvements need to be done in order to get to the ultimate targeted mobile tablet display.

Mieke Van Bavel, science editor, imec, Belgium

May 23, 2012 — SouthWest NanoTechnologies, Inc. (SWeNT), maker of high-quality, single-wall and specialty multi-wall carbon nanotubes (CNT) and printable CNT inks, will debut new display manufacturing materials at Display Week 2012 at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center (Booth 452) June 3-8.

The 50th SID International Symposium, Seminar and Exhibition "Display Week," is the premier international gathering of scientists, engineers, manufactures and users in the electronic information displays field.

SWeNT CEO Dave Arthur, joined by Bob Praino of Chasm Technologies, Inc. (Chasm), will also present at a workshop entitled "Carbon Nanotube Technology and Selected Applications" on Monday, June 4th from 8:30 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. in room 105. SWeNT and Chasm are alliance partners.

At booth 452, SWeNT will highlight applications for its line of conductive and semi-conductive CNT inks for flexible printed electronics and displays. SWeNT inks are based on V2V Ink technology developed by Chasm. Using Single-Wall CNTs, these inks can be printed using commercial, high-volume printing methods and equipment, including flexographic, gravure and screen printing.

The breakthrough process eliminates the need for subtractive patterning, which results in a lower cost solution where patterning of the conductive or semiconducting ink is required. Additionally, V2V technology eliminates post-production processes needed to remove viscosity modifiers and surfactants that are present with other printable CNT inks and that degrade optoelectronic performance. Combined with SWeNT’s unique ability to tailor the synthesis of CNT materials for applications using its patented CoMoCAT process, customers are able to print large area, low-cost devices for a wide range of applications including affordable displays, photovoltaics and printed electronics.

Chasm Technologies, Inc. was established in March 2005 to commercialize new products using novel nanomaterials and to develop scalable manufacturing processes for coated and printed thin films. The company is located in Canton, Massachusetts. For more information, visit www.chasmtek.com.

 SouthWest NanoTechnologies (SWeNT) is a privately-held specialty chemical company that manufactures high quality Single-Wall and Specialty Multi-Wall carbon nanotubes and printable inks for a range of products and applications.  SWeNT was established in 2001 to spin off CNT research developed at the University of Oklahoma.  For more information, visit www.swentnano.com.

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May 23, 2012 — Active matrix small/medium displays, less than 9”, recorded 2 billion worldwide shipments (units) in 2011, up 6% over 2010, said NPD Displaysearch.

Mobile phones saw highest growth, from 1.4 billion to 1.5 billion, largely due to use of active-matrix small/medium displays in smartphones. Smartphones cannibalized digital still camera (DSC) and portable media player (PMP) demand, which tempered the by-unit growth rate of these displays to 6%. Smartphone demand also pushed displays into larger and wider screen form factors, higher resolutions, and wider viewing angles. More active-matrix small-medium displays are touchscreens because of smartphone requirements.

Active-matrix small/medium displays are made of active-matrix organic light-emitting diodes (AMOLED), electrophoretic (AMEPD), and thin-film transistor liquid crystal display (TFT LCD) technologies — all had double-digit revenue growth in 2011. AMOLED had 182% Y/Y growth. AMEPD rode e-reader demand to 43% Y/Y growth. TFT LCD revenues grew 19%, with the low-temperature polysilicon (LTPS) form of TFT LCD used in smart phones growing at 36% Y/Y.

For the whole active-matrix small/medium displays sector, revenue went up 29% to $28 billion in 2011, reflecting a shift to higher-performance/price displays. Consumers in general, and smartphone buyers in particular, will pay a premium for better displays, said Hiroshi Hayase, NPD DisplaySearch VP of small/medium display research.

Figure 1. Active-matrix small/medium displays, shipment by application. SOURCE: NPD DisplaySearch Quarterly Small/Medium Shipment and Forecast Report.

 

As expected, Samsung Mobile Display (SMD) retained the top position for the second year in a row, claiming 17.2% of the market share for active-matrix small/medium displays in 2011, primarily due to increased AMOLED in smartphones. Following SMD, Sharp and Chimei Innolux kept the second and third positions in 2011, securing 13.5% and 9.5% of the market share, respectively.

Toshiba, Sony, and Hitachi all entered the small/medium AMFPD market, under a venture named Japan Display Inc. (JDI). Although the company started operations in April 2012, a review of 2011 figures indicates that a combination of Toshiba, Sony and Hitachi market shares total 17.2%, the exact same percentage as the 2011 share held by marketplace leader SMD. JDI could emerge as a new leading company in the small/medium FPD marketplace in 2012.

Figure 2. Revenue share of small/medium AMFPD by FPD maker in 2011. SOURCE: NPD DisplaySearch Quarterly Small/Medium Shipment and Forecast Report.

The NPD DisplaySearch Quarterly Small/Medium Shipment and Forecast Report covers the entire range of small/medium (<9.0”) displays shipped worldwide and regionally. The report analyzes historical shipments and projects forecasts. The Quarterly Small/Medium Shipment and Forecast Report now offers advanced features that allow users to track data by viewing-angle and 3D capabilities. NPD DisplaySearch is a global market research and consulting firm specializing in the display supply chain, as well as the emerging photovoltaic/solar cell industries.

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May 23, 2012 — Researchers from A*STAR’s Institute of Materials Research and Engineering (IMRE) in Singapore and their commercial partners developed a plastic that reflects 0.09-0.20% of the visible light hitting its surface, thanks to a nanostructuring that mimics the folds in a moth’s eye.

Existing anti-reflective and anti-glare plastics in the market typically have reported reflectivity of around 1% of visible light. The new plastic could improve TV displays, solar cells, and other surfaces.

The plastic maintains low reflectivity (<0.7%) at angles up to 45°, enabling wider viewing angles with less glare on televisions, and larger light-absorption areas on organic solar cells.

Figure. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) image showing the engineered anti-reflective nanostructures (left) that mimic structures found in a moth’s eye (moth close-up right, ©iStockphoto.com/Roman Nikolenko).

IMRE developed a nanoimprint process to fabricate the plastic. Nanoimprinting forms the plastic by engineering its physical aspects rather than using chemicals to change material properties. The process evolved from a lithography technology for the semiconductor industry and now suits a range of applications. This plastic is engineered into complex hierarchical “moth-eye” anti-reflective structures by placing nanoscale structures on top of other microstructures.

Now, the researchers are “developing complementary research that allows the technology to be easily ramped-up to an industrial scale,” said Dr Low Hong Yee, IMRE senior scientist leading the research.

Several companies are in the process of licensing the anti-reflective nanostructure technology from Exploit Technologies Pte Ltd, the technology transfer arm of A*STAR. This plastic material is the first successful result of the IMRE-led Industrial Consortium On Nanoimprint (ICON), which partners local and overseas companies to promote the manufacturing of nanoimprint technology. “The…consortium work will benefit our company’s expansion into new markets such as in the touchscreen panel and solar business sectors," said Wilson Kim Woo Yong, director, global marketing from Young Chang Chemical Co. Ltd. ICON promotes versatile, industry-ready nanoimprinting technology that can bring products to the market through sustainable manufacturing. Members of ICON work on joint projects to develop new products and applications that can potentially have huge savings in R&D. ICON began working on anti-reflective materials in August 2010.

The  Institute  of  Materials  Research  and  Engineering  (IMRE) is a research  institute  of  the  Agency  for  Science,  Technology  and Research  (A*STAR) in Singapore. The Institute has capabilities in materials analysis & characterization, design & growth, patterning & fabrication, and synthesis & integration for organic solar cells, photovoltaics, printed electronics, catalysis, bio-mimetics, microfluidics, quantum dots, heterostructures, sustainable materials, atom technology, and other research. For more information about IMRE, visit www.imre.a-star.edu.sg. For more information about A*STAR, please visit www.a-star.edu.sg.

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May 22, 2012 — Indium Corporation acquired a manufacturing facility in Rome, NY, to expand its production capacities of indium-, gallium-, germanium-, and tin-based materials, as well as other compounds.

Growing sales to solar photovoltaic, flat panel display (FPD), semiconductor and packaging, optical fiber, and light-emitting diode (LED) manufacturers necessitated the expansion.

The new facility enables Indium