Super-thin flexible OLED from Sony

October 7, 2009 by Lin Edwards

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Vaio with flexible OLED screen. Image: Scott Ard/CNET

(PhysOrg.com) -- Sony is showing off prototypes incorporating its super-thin, flexible OLED technology at the CREATEC JAPAN 2009 IT and electronics trade show in Makuhari Messe (Chiba) in Japan.

Sony's new "bendable" and transparent organic light emitting diode (OLED) technology is being shown in prototypes featuring an OLED a mere 0.2 mm thick. The prototype devices are a Vaio notebook, a flexible e-book, and a Walkman bracelet.

The OLED screen is transparent and flexible, and the viewing angle range is almost unlimited. OLED technology has a number of advantages over LEDs, including higher efficiency, faster response times, and no requirement for backlighting. The devices also have very low energy needs.

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Sony's flexible OLED-based Vaio notebook--not coming to a store near you. Image: Scott Ard/CNET

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The Sony Reader and Walkman redone with flexible OLED technology. Image: Scott Ard/CNET

Early efforts to manufacture transparent and flexible OLEDs met with resolution problems and distortions of the image when the device was bent or folded.

Sony demonstrated an OLED television in 2008 at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, and a flexible 0.2 mm thick OLED audio player at this year's show. Several other companies, such as Samsung and LG, are also working on flexible OLED displays.

The devices on show at CEATEC JAPAN are all at the concept stage and there is no indication of when, or even if, they will ever be marketed.

The CEATEC (Combined Exhibition of Advanced Technologies ) JAPAN event showcases IT and electronic innovations. The theme for 2009 is "Digital Convergence ? Defining the Shape of Our Future". The exhibition opened on October 6 and runs until October 10.

via CNet News

© 2009 PhysOrg.com

• RayCherry - Oct 07, 2009
  • Rank: 5 / 5 (1)
  The technology superhighway has a traffic jam. Since the global economic 'accident', technology distribution is operating much slower than innovation and maturation, leaving us with a retail queue of, in this case, display products from Plasma, through LCD, LED and Flexible OLEDs ...
  
  How long should we wait, and should we buy the interim products?
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• powercosmic - Oct 07, 2009
  • Rank: 2 / 5 (1)
  I'm not buying the interim products, why would you?
  
  OLEDs will be much lower power than current tech, besides by not buying the prices come down faster.
  
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• alq131 - Oct 07, 2009
  • Rank: 4 / 5 (1)
  It's not the distribution that is in a traffic jam. Much of it is still the manufacturing capabilities. On the range of products, all offer different capabilities. Some people prefer plasma over LED and vice versa. As for OLED, being the new kid on the block means that they are still trying to manufacture these and get high yields. Initial launches will be very expensive and probably only available to the early adopters.
  
  Basically, if you're in the market for a TV now, get one that has the performance and price you need. Waiting for new tech is an uncertain gamble.
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• otto1923 - Oct 07, 2009
  • Rank: 1 / 5 (1)

  How long should we wait, and should we buy the interim products?

  Buy what you can afford exactly when youll be needing it. I'm waiting for HUD eyecover films and audio parenteral implants. Tomorrow?
  
  That little notebook is magnificent.
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• DoktorSerendipitous - Oct 07, 2009
  • Rank: 4 / 5 (1)
  No implants. When they fail, who is going to pay for the cost of removal and re-implant surgery? Those kinds of implant are yet another bionic "improvement" waiting to push our health care cost to the stratosphere.
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• PPihkala - Oct 07, 2009
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  "OLED technology has a number of advantages over LEDs, including higher efficiency, faster response times, and no requirement for backlighting."
  
  It would make much more sense if the above text would have been written with LCD instead of current word LED. OLEDs are competitors of LCD, not with inorganic LEDs.
  
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• dhughes - Oct 08, 2009
  • Rank: 4 / 5 (1)
  Sure it's interesting and I want it now, but not from Sony, remember that rootkit they put on your computer? Even the removal tool didn't work, and no real apology from Sony either only to say sorry they were caught red-handed, and red-faced.
  
  If Sony wants to treat their customers like criminals, guilty before innocent, well they can keep their products.
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• otto1923 - Oct 08, 2009
  • Rank: 4 / 5 (2)

  pay for the cost of removal and re-implant surgery?

  Cost? Why, the govt will pay. Cheap actually, as both procedures will be entirely automated using robotic surgeons. Technology is going to change medicine in unimaginable ways. Why do you think this adjustment is happening now?
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• acarrilho - Oct 10, 2009
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  It's speculated by some that the level of automation achieved today could already make everything free, if some did not enjoy having so much more than others. I tend to think this is true.
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• Buyck - Oct 11, 2009
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  The products showed in the video and in the article stunning. When are they on the market? I hope by 2 years!
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• TJ_alberta - Oct 12, 2009
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  every tiny bopper in the world is going to want a bracelet like that.
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