Next step in organic flexible AMOLED unveiled

The display offers further proof that organic transistor technology offers display makers the best path to truly flexible, ultra-thin, lightweight AMOLEDs, and is the world’s first all-organic AMOLED display made using a toolkit of processing capabilities already proven industrially.

One application for the technology is wearables – a market calling out for displays and sensors that can conform to the curved and irregular shapes of the human body. OTFT is the only transistor technology offering the true flexibility needed for wearables: for example in smart bracelets, the size of usable screen area can be significantly increased once you can bend a display around your wrist.

The flex AMOLED display was made using Plastic Logic’s truly flexible oTFT backplane technology, combined with Novaled’s OLED frontplane materials. The market for flex AMOLED displays is set to grow to $23bn by 2023 (IHS 2014 report), fuelled by the pull for flexible displays for wearables and the Internet of Things.

Through its OTFT development and industrialisation process, Plastic Logic has created unique IP and a highly transferable process-flow, and has a Partner Programme to work with leading global display makers and consumer electronics companies to enable flexible, plastic AMOLED supply chains through licensing and technology transfer to existing manufacturers. Plastic Logic is now actively seeking companies to join its Partner Programme to take flexible electronics and wearable technology into mainstream production. Indro Mukerjee, CEO of Plastic Logic, commenting on the second demonstrator said: ‘The speed with which the second demonstrator display followed the first is a testament to the depth of the IP and know-how in manufacturing processes, materials sets and architectures that Plastic Logic has built up over the past 13 years. Colour is our next target.’