OE-A Brochure2013 Web

5th Edition

A working group within

Organic and Printed ElectronicsApplications, Technologies and Suppliers

6th International Exhibition and Conference for the Printed Electronics Industry

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Messe Mnchen, Germany

Conference: May 2628, 2014Exhibition: May 2728, 2014

2nd picture from above: Audi AGOrganic solar cell: Fraunhofer ISE

May

Organic and Printed ElectronicsApplications, Technologies and Suppliers

2 ORGANIC AND PRINTED ELECTRONICS

03 Editorial

Printed Electronics in Your Hands!

04 Welcome to the OE-A

10 OE-A Roadmap for Organic and Printed Electronics

30 The Future of Printed Products Interactive Cover Page

32 Organic and Printed Electronics:

OE-A Demonstrators Illustrate the Potential

34 Market for Organic and Printed Electronics

36 List of OE-A Members Represented

102 Competence Matrix

114 OE-A Members

120 Imprint

ContentsContents

ORGANIC AND PRINTED ELECTRONICS 3

Printed Electronics in Your Hands!

A special edition of this issue includes an interac-

tive cover page, which can light up! In keeping

with our tradition of providing functional give-

away demonstrators in our brochure, we are

pleased to present to you a multifunctional

printed electronics device that is directly inte-

grated in the cover page for the first time. This

impressively shows how thin, lightweight and

flexible printed electronics can add functionality

to traditional print products such as journals or

packages, thus enabling a completely new class

of products and possibilities applications in

advertising and marketing are just a few exam-

ples. The interactive cover page was produced

by OE-A members in an automated process; it

shows that this new technology has reached the

manufacturing state in which is can be inte-

grated into real products.

This industry is moving at an impressive speed,

is acting globally and is now witnessing new

products entering the market. The combination

of printed and classical electronics and the inte-

gration of printed electronics into systems are

general trends that are taking place in major

fields like automotive, consumer electronics,

printing and packaging, architectural, pharma-

ceutical and medical applications as well as in

textiles and fashion.

More and more products are entering our daily

life. OLED displays and lighting, packages that

light up, touch screens and switches for a variety

of surfaces, flexible solar cells and batteries, self-

dimming rear-view mirrors in cars, or printed

sensors in diabetes test strips and smart packag-

ing for the pharmaceutical industry are just a few

examples in which organic and printed electron-

ics reaches everybody.

At this point in the cycle, it is even more impor-

tant for our community to have an international

platform for the exchange of information, for

collaboration and cooperation. Our supply chains

are international and globally linked, and the

OE-A facilitates the establishment of these sup-

ply chains through a variety of activities which

ultimately help the industry to grow. The start of

international standardization activities under the

leadership of IEC and supported by the OE-A

is another important signal that this emerging

industry is entering a next level of maturity.

The OE-A is the key international industry associa-

tion for organic and printed electronics, and it is

growing constantly. With more than 215 members

from 31 countries in Europe, North America, Asia,

and Australia, we cover the entire value chain and

are a unique network of world-leading companies

and research institutes, with growth in member-

ship increasingly from end-user industries.

This brochure will be published at LOPE-C. At this

event, we provide the premier international

marketplace for the community covering the full

spectrum: commercialization, applications,

technology and science of organic and printed

electronics.

The OE-A roadmap summary is a compilation of

the views of its members on the future develop-

ment of this industry. The fifth edition of this

roadmap, which has been expanded and updated

in this issue, is included here. In this brochure you

will also find information about the OE-A, our

members and their respective products and com-

petencies, as well as a market forecast for these

emerging electronics.

We hope this industry directory for Organic and

Printed Electronics will serve as a launch pad to

help you find the right partners for your business.

June 2013

Dr. Stephan KirchmeyerChairman OE-A Board, Heraeus Precious Metals GmbH & Co. KG

Dr. Stephan Kirchmeyer Dr. Klaus Hecker

Welcome to the fifth edition of the OE-A brochure.

Dr. Klaus HeckerManaging Director, OE-A


The vision of the OE-A (Organic and Printed Elec-

tronics Association) is to build a bridge between

science, technology and applications to grow

an industry of emerging electronics. The OE-A

enables and fosters collaboration by members of

the value chain starting from research to inte-

gration into final end-products by coordinating,

harmonizing and facilitating their activities.

The global interest in organic and printed elec-

tronics is booming. Almost every sector of our

economy will be affected, if not revolutionized, by

organic and printed electronics. Initial products

have entered the market. The technology has

huge potential, but materials, equipment, pro-

cesses and applications still have to be developed

and improved.

OE-A The Organization

The membership of OE-A is growing fast.

Founded in December 2004, more than 215

members in 31 countries from Europe, Asia,

North America and Australia have joined OE-A.

Welcome to the OE-A

Emerging electronics means electronics beyond the

classical silicon approach, including: flexible, printed electronics

from organic, polymeric or inorganic materials.

Figure 2: OE-A involves the whole value chain of organic and printed electronics.

Figure 1: Membership development of the OE-A. The network of the OE-A has been growing rapidly worldwide since its formation in December 2004.

Membership Development of the OE-A

200

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Competencies of the OE-A Members

Material Suppliers: 20 %

Equipment Manufacturers: 21 %

Device Manufacturers:13 %

Services:


Our members are:

component and material suppliers

equipment and tool suppliers

producers / integrators

system integrators and distributors

end-users

research institutes and universities

OE-A is a working group within VDMA, the

German Engineering Federation. The OE-A head-

quarters is located in Frankfurt, Germany, and our

North American office is in Pittsburgh, PA., USA.

What OE-A Can Do for You

Networking Our International Approach

Creating the right partnerships is essential to

companies and research institutes and OE-As

strength is its global reach.

With frequent Working Group Meetings in

Europe, North America and Asia, OE-A supports

its members with an effective networking and

communication platform, fostering collaboration

and promoting information exchange among all

players along the value chain worldwide.

Market and Technology Information /

Roadmap

Being well-informed enables you to make the

right decisions. Its all about keeping track of

todays ever-increasing information flow.

OE-A provides its members with up-to-date

market and technology information. Dedicated

The OE-A is assigned to the VDMA division Innovative Business,

which includes such related associations as Productronics (Produc-

tion Equipment for Microelectronics), Photovoltaic Equipment,

German Flat Panel Display Forum (DFF), Battery Production and

Micro Technology. These partner associations provide sector-

specific expertise to their member companies, many of which are

business partners to the organic and printed electronics industry.

Our internal network also provides us with excellent contacts to

the printing and packaging as well as plastics and paper equip-

ment industries.

The German Engineering Federation (VDMA) is one of the key

industry associations in Europe and offers the largest engineering

industry network in Europe. With more than 3,100 member

companies, predominantly small and medium-sized enterprises,

VDMA represents 38 fields throughout the entire investment

goods industry from the classical machinery sector to high-tech

fields like robotics and automation. VDMA is located in Frankfurt,

Germany, with branch offices in Berlin, Brussels, Tokyo, Beijing,

Shanghai, Moscow, Kolkata, New Dehli and Mumbai.

Strengthening Synergies the VDMA Innovative Business Division

working groups focused on applications and

technologies help to create a roadmap for organic

and printed electronics. These experts provide a

forecast for the main application areas and tech-

nologies for organic and printed electronics and

identify the major hurdles yet to be overcome.

A summary of the 5th edition of the OE-A Road-

map for organic and printed electronics is

Figure 3: Meet new business partners and increase your organizations industry exposure at OE-A Working Group Meetings in Europe, North America and Asia.


included in this brochure. The OE-A has addressed

the increasing requirement for information on

the growing market of next generation technolo-

gies for pharmaceutical packaging, medical tech-

nology and well-being by recently adding the

new healthcare roadmap.

Our expertise arises not only from our member-

ship, but also from close cooperation with lead-

ing market intelligence companies and related

international associations.

Promoting Research Activities

Research and development plays a strategic role

in leveraging this emerging technology. The OE-A

fosters and promotes the expansion of R&D

activities on several different levels. We are in

close contact with national and European fund-

ing authorities, and we work with them to define

future R&D funding programs. Another one of

the OE-As important tasks is to support and to

help coordinate industrial R&D for the entire

organic and printed electronics sector.

In addition, the OE-A organizes projects that

develop giveaway and multifunctional demon-

strators. This time, a special edition of this

brochure with an interactive cover page was

developed and produced by OE-A members.

More than 20 companies and institutes continue

to provide a unique set of devices and materials

for the OE-A Toolbox which represents the state-

of-the-art of organic and printed electronic

components.

The OE-A sponsors an annual demonstrator com-

petition which awards the best demonstrators in

categories ranging from research to prototypes

and design concepts.

The OE-A is the perfect platform to find the right

partner for your business or for bi- or multilateral

R&D projects.

Figure 4: Summary of the 5th edition of the OE-A Roadmap for organic and printed electronics.

Portable chargers

Flexible segmented displays integrated into smart cards, price labels, bendable colour displays

Design projects

Primary single-cell batteries, memory for interactive games, ITO-free transparent conductive films

Garments with integrated sensors, anti theft, brand protection, printed test strips, physical sensors

Existing until 2013

Consumer electronics, customized mobile power

Bendable OLEDs, plastic LCD, in-moulded displays, large-area signage, rollable color displays

Transparent and decorative lighting modules

Rechargeable single-cell batteries, transparent conductors for touch sensors, printed reflective display elements

Integrated systems on garment), large-area physical sensor arrays and mass market intelligent packaging

Short term 20142016

Specialized building integration, off grid

Rollable OLEDs with OTFT, (semi-) transparent rollable displays, flexible consumer electronics

Flexible lighting

Printed multi-cell batteries, integrated flexible multi-touch sensors, printed logic chips

Textile sensors on fibre, dynamic price displays, NFC / RFID smart labels, disposable monitoring devices

Medium term 20172020

Building integration, grid connected PV

Rollable OLED TVs, telemedicine

General lighting technology

Directly printed batteries, active and passive devices to Smart Object

OLEDs on textile, fibre-electronics, health monitoring systems and smart buildings

Longer term 2021+

OE-A Roadmap for Organic and Printed Electronics Applications

Organic Photovoltaics

Flexible Displays

OLED Lighting

Electronics & Components

Integrated Smart

Systems

OE-A 2013


Figure 6: Printed electronic devices (Source: Kurz)

Education and Training

Highly qualified employees are the key to success.

To help the community find employees with

expertise in this emerging technology, the OE-A

initiated the Education and Training project. In

it, experts work together to develop education

and training programs that meet the industrys

needs.

Quality Control and Standardization

With the installation of mass-production capacity

for organic and printed electronics, standardiza-

tion and consistent characterization of devices

and high-throughput in-line quality control are

increasingly becoming a focus for companies.

The OE-A supports moving organic and printed

electronics into the market by organizing a work-

ing group that deals with quality control and

measurement; the group also develops dedicated

guidelines for device characterization as well as

testing methods for encapsulation systems.

The OE-A has been a major supporter of the

international standardization process under the

leadership of IEC (International Electrotechnical

Commission) and promotes the activities of

the Technical Committee IEC-TC 119 Printed

Electronics.

Upscaling Production

The transfer of lab-type processes to mass pro-

duction of organic and printed electronics lab-

to-fab is supported by the OE-A Working Group

Upscaling Production. Experts with a strong

background in production and development

collaborate in this group to develop concepts for

moving from the laboratory through pilot lines to

full-scale manufacturing, thereby supporting

OE-A members in upscaling production. To pro-

vide a unique insight into the industrial processes

of organic and printed electronics, the OE-A

Working Group Upscaling Production initiated

the LOPE-C Demo Line. Material suppliers, equip-

ment manufacturers and process developers

have consolidated their efforts to manufacture a

functional take-home demonstrator as part of

the LOPE-C exhibition.

Green Electronics

Green and sustainability aspects are key factors

for the acceptance and success of an emerging

technology. Factors relating to sustainability for

organic and printed electronic materials, processes,

products and applications include the efficient

use of materials, environmentally friendly

production, power efficiency of the products as

well as recyclability and disposal of products. The

OE-A Working Group Green provides guidelines

and methodologies for sustainability analysis.

Figure 5: Smart blister packaging (Source: Holst Centre)


Increasing Your Visibility

The OE-A promotes its members innovations

through a multitude of media outlets. This bro-

chure Organic and Printed Electronics, now

published in its fifth edition is just the tip of the

iceberg. Other examples are the OE-A Video,

Printed Electronics Ready to Go, that intro-

duces our industry to a broad audience, the

OE-A Newsletter, and the globally distributed

OPE Journal.

The OE-A arranges contacts with the interna-

tional press and with trade show and conference

organizers around the world for members. More-

over, we represent our members at international

trade fairs and conferences.

LOPE-C Large-area,

Organic & Printed Electronics Convention

One of the key tasks of the OE-A is to provide the

premier international marketplace for organic

and printed electronics. Along with our partner

Messe Munich, we have developed the leading

international trade show and conference for the

organic and printed electronics community.

LOPE-C is the premier event for end-users, manu-

facturers, investors, engineers and scientists in

organic and printed electronics and covers the

latest commercial and technological achieve-

ments.

Electronics Everywhere Big Opportunities

The combination of specialty materials with low-

cost, large-area fabrication processes (such as

printing) enables thin, lightweight, flexible and

low-cost electronics. This means that integrated

circuits, sensors, displays, memory, photovoltaic

cells or batteries can be made out of plastic.

Applications like flexible solar cells, flexible dis-

plays, lighting, RFID tags (radio frequency identi-

fication), single-use diagnostic devices or simple

consumer products and games are only a few

examples that represent a future multi-billion

Euro market. Smart objects (e. g., smart packag-

ing that integrates multiple organic and printed

devices) or smart textiles are additional examples

of applications in organic and printed electronics.

OLED displays, e-readers, printed electrodes for

several medical applications as well as printed

light sources, electrochromic rear-view mirrors,

and printed antennae for automotive applica-

tions have been on the market on a large scale for

several years.

Organic photovoltaics and OLED lighting-based

products, smart packaging, flexible batteries,

printed memory, transparent conductive films as

an ITO substitute for touch displays, smart phar-

maceutical blister packages for field trials and

smart cards with built-in displays for password

applications have become available. Within 3 to 4

years, additional products are expected to be

available to a mass market, and all of the above

mentioned applications, as well as several more,

will be available in large volumes.

Tremendous opportunities are opening up for

companies that invest in this field, regardless of

whether they are material suppliers, equipment

manufacturers, producers or system integrators.

Large-scale production capacity is presently

installed in Europe, the U.S., and Asia. On the

other hand, large-scale efforts and close collabo-

ration of all partners along the value chain

remain necessary to make organic and printed

electronics a true success story.

Cooperation and information exchange will lead

to mutual advantages. The OE-A provides the

international platform for the organic and

printed electronics community and helps the

industry to grow.

Curious? Dont hesitate to ask us for details!

Figure 7: LOPE-C is the premier marketplace for the organic and printed electronics industry.

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Messe Mnchen, GermanyConference: May 2628, 2014Exhibition: May 2728, 2014

LOPE-C is the leading international trade fair and conference for printed electronics in the high-tech business location of Munich. The exclusive business platform addresses manufacturers and users of a technology of the future across a wide range of

Organic solar cell: Fraunhofer ISE

industry sectors. It is innovative, exible, cost-effective and thus suitable for mass-market production. As the representative trade fair of this sector, LOPE-Chighlights current trends, presents innovative products,points to market opportunities for industry and promotes

Manufacturing processess 0RINTINGs 0HOTOLITHOGRAPHYs ,ASERs 3OLUTIONCOATINGs %NCAPSULATION

Assembly and packaging technology, system integrations %LECTRICALCONTACTINGs ,AMINATIONs ,ASERs 3YSTEMINTEGRATIONs (YBRIDSYSTEMS

Inspection and test systemss %LECTRICALPHYSICAL optical, chemical characterizations 3IMULATIONs ,IFETIMETESTINGs 1UALITY0ROCESSCONTROL

Devices s 4RANSISTORSAND diodess 0ASSIVESs $ISPLAYSs 0HOTOVOLTAICCELLSs 3ENSORSs !NTENNASs "ATTERIES

Applications s 3OLARCELLSs $ISPLAYSs 3MARTTEXTILESs 3PEAKERSs ,IGHTINGs )NTEGRATEDSMART systemss 2&)$

Services s #ONSULTINGs 2$s 0ROFESSIONALAND trade associationss 6ENTUREANDEQUITY capitalization

Materials s 3UBSTRATESs #ONDUCTORSs 3EMICONDUCTORSs $IELECTRICSs %NCAPSULATION materials and resins

LOPE-C Exhibition: The entire value chain for printed electronics.

LOPE-C Conference: One Congress Many Components.

Plenary session: delivered by international experts

Business conference and Investor forum: with focus on commercialization

Technical conference: with focus on new technologies and applications

Scienti c conference and Poster session: delivered by established and young scientists

Short courses: featuring established industry and academic experts

Visitor target groups:

Automotive

"UILDINGANDARCHITECTURE

Chemical

Consumer electronics

Energy

Lighting

Logistics

Mechanical engingeering

Medical and pharmaceutical

Packaging

Printing and graphic arts

Textiles and fashion

the development of new materials, manufacturing processes and applications. This makes the event the most important gathering in the eld of printed electronics.


Organic and printed electronics is based on the

combination of new materials and cost-effective,

large-area production processes that open up

new fields of application. Thin, lightweight,

flexible and environmentally friendly electronics

thats what organic electronics aims to deliver.

It also enables a wide range of electrical

components that can be produced and directly

integrated in low-cost reel-to-reel processes.

Intelligent packaging, OLED lighting, printed

multi functional systems, rollable displays, flex-

ible solar cells, disposable diagnostic devices or

games, flexible touchscreens, and printed

batteries are just a few examples of promising

fields of application for organic electronics based

on new large-scale processable electrically con-

ductive and semi-conducting materials. Organic

electronics can be used by itself, but also as part

of a heterogeneous system combining printed

and organic components and silicon, each where

they make the most sense. These heterogeneous

systems will be especially important in the first

generations of products.

In the following pages, you will find an updated

overview of the organic and printed electronics

applications, technologies and devices, as well as

a discussion of the different technology levels

that can be used in producing organic electronic

products. We have taken account of the exciting

technical progress made since the last edition

and the appearance of first products, and have

made some changes to the grouping of applica-

tions within clusters. In particular, we have

included EL lighting now into Electronics and

Components, fitting with its areas of commercial

applications, and moved RFID into Integrated

Smart Systems, as organic RFID is expected to

find its primary application in smart systems

rather than as a competitor to Si-based EPC

applications in the near future.

At the time of the last roadmap, products were

starting to enter the market, and this trend has

continued, so that commercial products are

available in all of the key technology areas. First

organic electronic products reached the market a

number of years ago, e.g., passive ID cards that

are mass-printed on paper and are used for tick-

eting or toys. Flexible lithium polymer batteries

produced in a reel-to-reel process have been

available for several years and can be used for

smart cards and other mobile consumer prod-

ucts. Printed electrodes for glucose test strips or

for electrocardiograms are common. Organic

photovoltaics (OPV) modules integrated into bags

to charge mobile electrical devices are commer-

OE-A Roadmap for Organic and Printed Electronics

The roadmap for organic and printed electronics is a key activity of

the OE-A. Organic electronics is a platform technology that enables

multiple applications that are based on organic electronics but

vary widely in their specifications. This technology is still in its early

stage; while increasing numbers of products are available and

some are in full production, many applications are still in lab-scale

development, prototype activities or early production. Nonetheless,

it is important to develop a common opinion about what kind of

products, processes and materials will be available and when.

For this fifth version of the OE-A Roadmap, key teams of experts in

five application clusters and three technology areas developed

roadmaps for their fields, which were presented to and discussed

with the OE-A members during association meetings. The resulting

roadmap is a synthesis of these results representing common

perspectives of the groups.

We present here a summary of the fifth version of the roadmap,

which is a supplement to and improvement on the fourth version

presented in 2011.

The goal of this roadmap is to help the industry, government agen-

cies and scientists plan and align their R&D activities and product

plans, for example, by identifying promising applications and key

challenges requiring breakthroughs. Roadmapping, especially in

such a young industry, is an ongoing process and the OE-A will

continue this key activity.

A White Paper explaining the 2011 roadmap in more detail is

already available for download from the OE-A website

(www.oe-a.org), and a White Paper for the current version will

be released later in 2013. For further details please contact the

OE-A secretariat.

The OE-A Roadmap


cially available. Printed antennae are commonly

used in (still Si-based) RFID tags. Large-area

organic pressure sensors for applications such as

retail logistics have recently been introduced.

First organic LED (OLED) lighting based products

became available just before the last edition of

the roadmap and have grown, with the number

of both commercial OLED lighting products and

large-scale installations at lighting trade fairs

much larger than at the time of the last edition

of the roadmap. User tests of smart cards with

built-in displays for one-time password applica-

tions were already started before the last road-

map and have started to be commercialized. New

products such as flexible, roll-to-roll-produced

e-paper price labels have been commercially

installed into stores, printed RF-driven smart

objects have become commercially available, and

printed non-volatile memory is being sold to

product developers. Recently, printed systems

incorporating organic electronics have also

become commercial; for example, a rechargeable

battery-powered flashlight containing OPV to

recharge the battery, first shown as an OE-A

demonstrator in 2011, can now be purchased.

Organic electronics has appeared in everyday

products where many people are not even aware

that they contain organic electronics, e.g., self-

dimming rearview mirrors in cars or OLED dis-

plays in smart phones. While we do not explicitly

investigate these already existing products in this

forward-looking roadmap, they are evidence that

organic electronics is already becoming an

industry.

Unbreakable displays with OTFT (organic thin

film transistor) backplanes have been piloted,

but full product introduction has been delayed;

however, development of unbreakable and even

rollable displays has continued. While no organic

electronic products have truly achieved full mass

market introduction, with the possible exception

of OLED displays, it appears that this is likely for

some products within the next few years.

Organic electronics is based on the combination of a new class of

materials and large-area, high-volume deposition and patterning

techniques. Often terms like emerging, printed, plastic, polymer,

flexible, printable inorganic, large-area or thin film electronics or

abbre viations like OLAE or FOLAE (Flexible and/or Organic Large

Area Electronics) are used, which essentially all mean the same

thing: electronics beyond the classical approach. For simplicity, we

have used the term organic electronics in this roadmap, but keep

in mind that we are using the term in this broader sense.

Organic Electronics

Figure 1: Overview of the OE-A Roadmap for organic and printed electronics applications.


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In the applications section which follows, we

have updated our forecast for the market entry

on larger scales for various applications and

reviewed the appearance of first products. We

have also re-examined the key application and

technology parameters and principle challenges

(so-called red brick walls) seen for further devel-

opment of organic electronics. In the technology

section we also take account of recent progress in

new materials and improved processes.

Applications

Organic and printed electronics is a platform

technology that is based on organic conducting

and semi-conducting as well as printable

inorganic materials. It opens up new possibilities

for applications and products. As in previous

roadmap editions, some key applications have

been chosen to demonstrate the needs from the

application side, identify major challenges, cross-

check with the possibilities of the technology and

forecast a time frame for the market entry in

large volumes.

Below, we continue to look at applications

discussed in the previous edition of the roadmap,

clustered into the five groups OLED Lighting,

Organic Photovoltaics, Flexible Displays,

Electronics and Components (printed memory,

batteries, active devices and logic, and passive

devices) and Integrated Smart Systems (smart

objects, RFID, sensors and smart textiles). Figure 1

gives an overall view of the expected develop-

ment of the five clusters.

The large number of applications reflects the

complexity of the topic and the wide possible

uses for organic electronics, and it is likely that

the list will even grow in the future. This is one

reason for grouping applications into related

clusters in order to make it possible to maintain

an overview. The application fields and specifica-

tions cover a wide range, and although several

parameters like accuracy of the patterning

process or electrical conductivity of the materials

are of central importance, the topic cannot

currently be reduced to one or two simple scaling

laws such as the increase in transistors per chip

for silicon formulated by Moore in 1965. Regard-

less, we will watch the trends and find out

whether it will be possible to find an analogue to

Moores law for organic electronic. Some poten-

tial scaling trends are starting to be visible, such

as higher resolution patterning processes and

increased charge carrier mobilities, which can

improve device packing density and performance

in a similar way that has been observed in

Si electronics.

The question whether there is one killer applica-

tion for organic electronics still cannot be

answered with certainty. There are many differ-

Figure 2: OLED lighting product. (Source: OSRAM)


ent fields in which the advantages of organic

electronics might result in the right application

to become a killer application, but at this point,

it is too early to predict where this is most likely

to happen, though OLED displays are making

strong progress. Past experience with new tech-

nologies has shown that the predicted killer

applications are frequently not the ones that

really open up the largest markets. Therefore, one

has to continue the work on the roadmap, as is

planned, follow the current trends and take

account of new developments as they occur.

In fact, with the increasing diversity of organic

electronics it is unclear whether there will be a

single killer app or if gradual market penetra-

tion in a variety of areas is more likely. At the

moment, we are starting to see market penetra-

tion in a variety of areas and it looks as if, for the

near future, organic growth in many areas is a

more likely scenario than an explosive killer app

in only one or two areas.

Applications Roadmap

OLED Lighting is an example of Solid State Light-

ing (SSL), which also includes LED-based lighting

and is seen as the most promising approach for

future lighting due to lack of hazardous materi-

als, flexible form factor, high energy efficiency

and long lifetime. The LED lighting industry is

growing rapidly, but OLED lighting continues to

make progress both technically and toward com-

mercialization. OLED lighting has grown out of

the technical progress made in developing the

OLED display industry but has increasingly

focused on the specific properties of OLEDs that

are relevant to lighting. OLED lighting products

promise novel features in the longer term: large-

area, very thin and optionally flexible or non-

planar form factor, and variable color are all

feasible with OLED lighting, and new lighting

applications can be expected to take advantage

of these properties, for example, embedded light-

ing or homogeneous area lighting.

While OLED lighting has not yet reached the

mass market, limited-release prototypes and

commercial products have become available to

demonstrate the potential and allow interested

users to try out OLED technology (Figure 2). A

number of European and Japanese companies

have shown advanced prototype products, and in

the USA the Department of Energy has supported

OLED lighting development strongly. Though

both vacuum deposited and solution processed

OLEDs are possible, vacuum deposited devices are

more efficient and dominate the market, though

much development is ongoing in improving solu-

tion processed OLEDs. The market is expected to

grow, especially if some key challenges such as

lowering the production cost and developing

reliable and cost-effective encapsulation are met.

Organic Photovoltaics (OPV) comprises both

hybrid systems (e.g., combining titania and dyes)

as well as systems using only organic semicon-

ductors. Flexible dye-sensitized titania and poly-

mer-based OPV modules have been available for

some years now, and products integrating

flexible OPV modules have been commercially

available since 2010. These applications target

low-power consumer applications, e.g., modules

for battery chargers for mobile electronics such

as cell phones, PV-powered computer keyboards,

or the mobile laser pointer shown in Figure 3.

Despite the difficult market for PV in general in

the last couple of years and the significant set-

back of the loss of a key OPV pioneer, both techni-

cal and commercial development is continuing.

Laboratory scale cells have now reached efficien-

cies that can compete with thin film silicon, while

the number of pilot and small production lines

has increased. OPV shows a combination of

unique points: lightweight, flexible design with

options for color and semi-transparency, good

performance in low and diffuse light, reduced

environmental footprint and customizable

formats which allow them to address market

niches not in direct competition with crystalline

silicon technologies. Short term applications will Figure 3: Battery powered laser pointer with OPV charger. (Source: Mekoprint)


be mostly in consumer electronic and portable

power sources. In the medium term, novel forms

of building-integrated OPV will appear. The long-

term perspective of energy generation remains

a driving vision, while novel business models

are also appearing to address unconventional

markets and channels to market.

Flexible Displays are an extension of flat panel

displays, which have had tremendous success in

replacing conventional displays such as cathode

ray tubes (CRTs) for use in computers and televi-

sions, and in enabling new products such as lap-

top and tablet computers, e-readers and smart

mobile phones. Flexible displays can dispense

with some key issues of current flat displays, such

as the presence of (breakable and relatively

heavy) glass and inability to be bent, rolled or

used with other than flat form factors. The

requirements for flexible displays depend

strongly on the intended type of use, e.g., of the

flexible displays roadmap we focus on the follow-

ing key types of use, e.g., information and signage

(conformal and lightweight is more important

than being bendable or rollable), reading (rug-

gedness, light weight and optionally bendability

or rollability are desired) or entertainment/multi-

media (where video rate, color and resolution are

critical in addition to the above factors).

The flexible display market has not developed

commercially as quickly as had been hoped,

partially due to industry restructuring and com-

petition from tablet computers, but there have

been advances as well. For example, flexible, roll-

to-roll-produced e-paper-based shelf tags have

been commercialized at a Finnish electronics

superstore chain, garnering very positive recep-

tion. Plastic Logic announced a new business

strategy, enabling the company to move beyond

the e-reader market into a variety of new markets

and applications, driven by flexible display solu-

tions. On the technology side, many of the key

players in the display market have showcased

prototypes of OLED-driven flexible displays,

including active matrix backplanes driven by

novel materials like oxide semiconductors. E Ink

has also announced flexible active-matrix EPD-

driven displays, and color EPD display prototypes

with organic TFT backplanes have been shown

(Figure 4). While simple signage is already avail-

able, we expect flexible commercial e-readers in

the near future, followed by trends to larger size,

higher resolution and full color as well as flexible

OLEDs in the future.

The Electronics and Components cluster in the

OE-A Roadmap encompasses printed memory,

flexible batteries, and active and passive devices.

These are the building blocks or toolkit out of

which future organic electronic products can be

made.

Printed memory is needed for applications where

the user is required to store and process informa-

tion. If the user wants to change the information

stored in the memory after production, a rewrit-

Figure 5: Printed addressable memory array with transistor logic. (Source: PARC and Thin Film Electronics ASA)

Figure 4: Flexible color e-reader display with organic TFT backplane. (Source: Plastic Logic)


able memory, either write once read many (WORM)

or rewritable random-access memory (RAM) is

necessary. Furthermore, for many applications

without constant power, the memory needs to

be non-volatile (NV). ID devices and promotional

cards using read-only memory (ROM), WORM or

NV-RAM were already hitting the market at the

time of the last roadmap and have continued to

make headway. Reference designs of toys using

NV-RAM memory have been launched, and appli-

cations using printed memory for brand protec-

tion (i.e., anti-fraud, anti-counterfeit uses) have

also emerged recently. Printed memory will be an

important component in future integrated smart

systems (see below), and technology develop-

ment is proceeding this way. For example, a

recently presented NV-RAM that includes CMOS

(Figure 5), and showed successful integration of

a sensor, a display, memory and transistor logic in

December 2012. The future is expected to bring

applications in increasingly complex systems,

moving from simple gaming and anti-fraud

applications into ticketing, display memory and

electronic products.

Most organic electronics applications target

mobile devices, and here power supply is a key

issue. Therefore flexible batteries (Figure 6) are of

central importance to leverage this technology.

A large variety of thin and even printed batteries

are commercially available. They are available for

discontinuous use today and will be constantly

improved in capacity, enabling continuous use.

Currently, non-rechargeable zinc-carbon batteries

are predominant for printed batteries, but there

is significant development in rechargeable bat-

teries, e.g., based on lithium, as well as research

activity on printed miniature supercapacitors,

which are a kind of cross between batteries and

conventional capacitors. There will be a progres-

sion from batteries that use printed parts,

through batteries that are fully printed in sepa-

rate processes, to batteries that are printed as

part of an integrated process for printing elec-

tronic systems, as well as a progression from sin-

gle charge through rechargeable batteries and

from single cells to multicell integration. In the

longer term, batteries will also be integrated

directly in textiles and packages.

Figure 6: Roll of printed Ni metal hydride batteries. (Source: VARTA Microbattery)

Figure 7: Printed logic circuit. (Source: Holst Centre)


Active devices are electronic components which

contain a semiconductor or other parts that cre-

ate active feedback on applying electric power.

In this edition of the roadmap we primarily are

looking at transistors, diodes, logic circuits, and

display elements. Organic Thin Film Transistors

(OTFT) are a basic component for electric switch

elements or integrated circuits, and can be used

as single component to amplify a current or

combined with other transistor as integrated

circuits or logic. The current flow between source

and drain electrode is switched, depending on

the voltage applied at the gate electrode. They

are typically not products by themselves but part

of other products like smart objects or integrated

systems. Diodes are rectifying devices which

allow current to flow at a positive voltage but

block it at negative voltages, and in addition to

their special uses in OLEDs and OPV are also

relevant in devices such as RF tags or energy har-

vesting systems. In the area of printed/organic

circuits (logic), multibit microprocessors have

been demonstrated by a number of research labs

and companies, as well as logic circuits for RFID

tags and organic memory control. Key factors and

challenges for future development and appear-

ance in more complex products include scaling

laws on thickness, lateral dimensions and charge

carrier mobility.

Display elements are further active components

for system integration, which can convert an

electrical signal into optical information. In

particular, both electrochromic and electro-

luminescent elements are being included.

Printed passive components based on printable

conductors and dielectrics have been used in

electronics manufacturing for some time now.

Due to the rapid development of printable elec-

tronics materials and corresponding processes,

such applications are becoming more and more

visible on the market. Resistors, capacitors and

inductors can also be printed. A special applica-

tion in this field is a printed code detectable by

touch sensors. Printed silver paste is the mostly

used conductive material to print conductive

tracks, but other metal or carbon pastes, nano-

carbon materials, or conductive polymers are see-

ing increased interest. A special case of capacitors

seeing increased interest for printed electronics

are supercapacitors, which can be used for

interim storage of energy, have much higher

capacitance than plate capacitors but higher

cycle life than batteries, and in the best case

essentially consist only of plastic, metal, carbon,

water and salt. A range of approaches to printed

antenna manufacturing (Figure 9) has also been

applied, including direct printing, plating, and

etch resist printing.

Electroluminescent films (EL) are available as

commercial lighting products used in low inten-

sity lighting such as backlighting, decoration and

advertising panels. EL lighting offers a number of

key user advantages: bendable, fast prototyping,

printable and easy product integration. EL light-

ing is focused on illuminating specific objects in

order to highlight them or create special effects.

It is not concerned with illumination of space. EL

is especially useful where complex form factors

(bending, thin shapes) are involved, limited edi-Figure 9: Printed antenna for RFID tags. (Source: Fraunhofer ENAS)

Figure 8: Smart shelf incorporating electrochromic display elements. (Source: Ynvisible)


Figure 10: Package featuring printed EL films. (Source: Karl Knauer)

tions, e.g., in packaging (Figure 10) specific after-

market and original equipment manufacture

(OEM) car models, and for fast product execution,

e.g., in advertising or exhibitions.

An area that has seen intense activity recently is

that of transparent conductive films. Today, ITO

(indium tin oxide) is still the most widely used

transparent conductive material, which is used in

nearly all optical devices like displays, OLEDs, OPV,

EMI shielding and especially in the rapidly

increasing market of touch sensor applications.

There is a huge market demand for ITO substi-

tutes, as it is quite brittle and relatively expen-

sive, so there is need for alternatives. Numerous

flexible and lower cost alternatives are coming

into the market. The alternative approaches to

transparent conductive films can be based either

on novel transparent conductive materials (see

technology section) or on the patterning of thin

metal films (metal mesh) on flexible polymer

substrates into high resolution transparent

conductive meshes (Figure 11); some of these

approaches have also seen market introduction

recently.

Integrated Smart Systems (ISS) bring together

multiple core functionalities to perform complex,

automated tasks without the need for external

electronic hardware. As organic electronics tech-

nology progresses, the applications will become

ever more challenging and complex. Typical func-

tionalities that one will expect to see on such

systems will be power (batteries, miniaturized

fuel cells, PV), input devices (physical, chemical

and biological sensors) and output devices Figure 11: Capacitive multitouch sensor based on printed metal mesh transparent conductive films. (Source: PolyIC)


(displays, visual, audible or haptic interfaces and

wireless communications), with these linked

together by sophisticated logic circuits and

memory. The addition of various forms of sample

processing and fluid handling will also involve

the integration of microfluidics into some

systems. Thus, the variety of applications for such

systems will be immense, made far greater by

their potential deployment into so many new

areas of application, from smart textiles to auto-

motive, aeronautical and environmental to health

and well-being. The component technologies

underpinned by the organic electronics field will

be essential to the success of such systems.

Sensors are the means by which the environment

is detected. Many of the characteristic features of

organic and printed electronics, such as high-

throughput parallel production including screen

printing, have already been used in the develop-

ment of printed sensors, and these exist already

as stand-alone products. Future development is

related to integration of sensors with other func-

tionalities into an integrated smart system. Both

optical and electrical/electrochemical sensor

components will be used, and we expect a

progression from currently available test strips

and physical sensor arrays (Figure 12) through

disposable test strips and integration of other

functionalities such as control electronics,

memory or display readouts in the medium term,

to smart buildings and skins in the longer term.

The key challenges to be faced are related to inte-

gration of different components and especially

interfacing to printed electronic circuitry.

Smart objects combine multiple electronics com-

ponents and functions to create innovative inte-

grated systems. A key advantage of organic and

printed electronics is the possibility to use low-

cost production methods to make these smart

objects light, flexible, cheap and even disposable.

Functional printing allows the integration of

Figure 13: RF activated smart objects. (Source: PolyIC)

Figure 12: Printed touch sensor array. (Source: plastic electronic)


different devices such as sensors, transistors,

memory, batteries or displays onto one substrate.

This integration may be realized either by one

process or by a combination of several separately

produced components. Sensor tags, dynamic

price display and rewritable RF tags are all exam-

ples of applications for smart objects. Since the

last edition of the roadmap, new products have

emerged, such as RF-driven smart object cards

(Figure 13) and printed electronic systems with

rewritable memory. A number of technology

developers have demonstrated increasingly com-

plex printed RFID tags as well. The roadmap for

smart objects and printed RFID, as a whole, is

more complex than for other areas of printed

electronics. However, these products make full

use of the cost and scalability advantages inher-

ent in this new set of production methods, and

thus, are potentially the most revolutionary. The

products in this chapter will likely not show con-

tinuous, step-wise improvement but rather, the

emergence of products of greater and greater

complexity (i.e., the emergence of entirely new

product families) as manufacturing processes

improve.

Smart textiles are fabrics that are able to alter

their characteristics to respond to external

stimuli (mechanical, electrical, thermal, and

chemical). In addition, functionalities such as

communication, displays, sensors, or thermal

management can be integrated into fabric to

enable wearable electronics. By taking advantage

of organic and printed electronics, the field of

smart textiles can make important technological

advances in the future. In the coming years

though, the use of standard electronic technol-

ogy such as Si chips or LEDs may still be required

in combination with printed components, and

heterogeneous integration will be common until

sufficiently high performance and integration

can be achieved for organic and printed electron-

ics and logic. Currently, much of this field is still in

the development or prototype stage, with signifi-

cant work going into areas such as stretchability

and hybrid integration. First products are expected

around 2014 (washable textile EL, Figure 14),

with evolution to more complex systems and

applications such as OLEDs coming later.

These application scenarios are summarized in

the OE-A Roadmap for organic electronics appli-

cations in Figures 1 and 15. In Figure 15 we show,

for each of the five application clusters, products

that have entered the market and are expected to

enter the market in the short (20142016),

medium (20172020) and longer (2021+) term.

Such a summary is by necessity not detailed.

These figures provide a high-level overview for

the whole field of organic and printed electronics

that has been distilled from the individual road-

maps.

Figure 14: Demonstrator of waterproof textile EL lighting on a high-visibility vest. (Source: Cetemmsa)

This list of products reflects the ideas from

todays point of view. Past experience of new

technology shows us that we are most likely to

be surprised by unexpected applications, and this

will almost certainly happen in the exciting but

nascent field of organic electronics. Therefore,

the technology and the market in this field will

continuously be watched and the roadmap will

be updated on a regular basis.

While we focus on clusters of applications based

on functions, organic electronics may contribute


to innovation in different industrial branches

such as automotive or health care (Figure 16)

with products covering a range of functions. For

this reason, OE-A has also begun to look at these

branches, and a roadmap for organic electronics

in health care is in preparation.

Significant progress has been made in the last

several years and first generations of products

have reached the market in significantly larger

numbers than at the time of the last roadmap.

On the other hand, growth had not yet been as

rapid as was predicted by many market research-

ers a number of years ago, which has led in some

circles to a degree of disillusionment. This report

indicates, however, that organic electronics is

indeed still moving ahead and is becoming an

industry, and the market analysis presented on

pages 34 and 35 in this brochure shows as well

that markets are being reached and will continue

to grow. Nonetheless, in order to fulfill the more

demanding specifications of more complex

future generations of products, further improve-

ment of materials, process, design and equip-

ment is necessary. In the next section, we look at

some of the main application parameters whose

development will be key to enabling future

product generations. After that, we will look at

the main technologies in organic electronics and

discuss the key technology parameters under-

lying the application parameters.

Key Application Parameters

The viability of each application or product will

depend on fulfillment of a number of parameters

that describe the complexity or performance of

the product (application parameters). For the

applications above, groups of specialists identi-

Figure 15: OE-A Roadmap for organic and printed electronics, with forecast for the market entry in large volumes (general availability) for the different applications. The table is a further development of and update to the fourth version of the OE-A Roadmap presented in 2011.

Portable chargers

Flexible segmented displays integrated into smart cards, price labels, bendable colour displays

Design projects

Primary single-cell batteries, memory for interactive games, ITO-free transparent conductive films

Garments with integrated sensors, anti theft, brand protection, printed test strips, physical sensors

Existing until 2013

Consumer electronics, customized mobile power

Bendable OLEDs, plastic LCD, in-moulded displays, large-area signage, rollable color displays

Transparent and decorative lighting modules

Rechargeable single-cell batteries, transparent conductors for touch sensors, printed reflective display elements

Integrated systems on garment), large-area physical sensor arrays and mass market intelligent packaging

Short term 20142016

Specialized building integration, off grid

Rollable OLEDs with OTFT, (semi-) transparent rollable displays, flexible consumer electronics

Flexible lighting

Printed multi-cell batteries, integrated flexible multi-touch sensors, printed logic chips

Textile sensors on fibre, dynamic price displays, NFC / RFID smart labels, disposable monitoring devices

Medium term 20172020

Building integration, grid connected PV

Rollable OLED TVs, telemedicine

General lighting technology

Directly printed batteries, active and passive devices to Smart Object

OLEDs on textile, fibre-electronics, health monitoring systems and smart buildings

Longer term 2021+


Organic Photovoltaics

Flexible Displays

OLED Lighting

Electronics & Components

Integrated Smart

Systems

OE-A 2013


Figure 16: Printed temperature sensor tag for pharmaceutical applications. (Source: Thin Film Electronics ASA)

fied the most important application and technol-

ogy parameters and requirements for different

generations of products. Here we list only a small

excerpt of the key application parameters that

have been identified as relevant to several of the

applications. Not surprisingly, the key application

parameters across the five application clusters

have not changed since the last edition or even

the one before that. The following list is in no

particular order since the relevance of the differ-

ent parameters varies for the diverse applications.

Complexity of the device

The complexity of the circuit (e.g., number of

transistors) as well as the number of different

devices (e.g., circuit, power supply, switch, sen-

sor, display) that are integrated have a crucial

influence on reliability and production yield.

Operating frequency of the circuit

With increasing complexity of the application

(e.g., increasing memory capacity) higher

switching speeds are necessary.

Lifetime / stability / homogeneity / reliability

Lifetime (shelf and operation), the environmen-

tal stability, stability against other materials

and solvents, and homogeneity of the materi-

als are an issue due to the intrinsic properties

of the materials.

Operating voltage

For mobile devices powered by batteries, PV or

radio frequency, it is essential to have low oper-

ating voltages (


Functional Materials

Organic and printed electronics rely on electri-

cally active materials that have conducting,

semi-conducting, luminescent, electrochromic or

electrophoretic properties. The materials have to

be carefully selected, since process conditions

and the interplay of the active material with

other layers such as dielectrics and passivation

materials in the device stack can greatly influence

the performance of the final device. Of the avail-

able materials there is a choice between organic

or inorganic, solution based or evaporated; the

selection of a specific material depends both on

the demands of the device application and the

choice of manufacturing technique employed. It

is very likely that in a final application several

approaches will be used in parallel.

Organic semiconductors have found uses in

active devices such as OLEDs, OPV, diodes and

transistors. Currently available materials can be

split into three classes: small molecules, amor-

phous polymers and semi-crystalline polymers.

The charge transport properties of these organic

semiconductors, which are dictated by their mor-

phologies and tendency for crystallization,

strongly depend on the deposition conditions

used. Both p-type and n-type organic semicon-

ductors have been developed, and research into

n-type materials has been increased over the past

years, due to their importance in the production

of CMOS circuits in combination with p-type

materials and matching dielectrics.

The charge carrier mobility of organic semicon-

ductors has improved dramatically in recent years

although it is still much lower than crystalline

silicon, but starting to be competitive with amor-

phous silicon. It is expected that the performance

of organic semiconductors will approach or

match polycrystalline silicon (poly-Si) in coming

years (Figure 17), first in research where mobili-

ties of up to 15 cm2/Vs have been reported, and

some time later in commercial products such as

the next generation of large format OLED displays.

In fact, the growth in charge carrier mobilities

might soon begin to appear as a kind of scaling

law in organic electronics, comparable to the

transistor density scaling according to Moores

law in microelectronics. As development moves

toward products, processability and reproducibil-

ity as well as mobility have become increasingly

important in order to enable real-world device

production. Leading material companies in the

field have spent ever increasing efforts focusing

on evaluation and improvement of these charac-

teristics, reaching a level where the first genera-

tions of products using these materials are

expected to launch in the near future.

Figure 17: OE-A Roadmap for the charge carrier mobility of semiconductors for organic and printed electronics applications. The values for amorphous silicon (a-Si) and polycrystalline silicon (poly-Si) are given for comparison.

Mobility of Semiconductors for Organic and Printed Electronics Applications

Ch

arge

car

rier

mob

ility

100

10

1

0.1

0.01 Existing Short term Medium term Longer term (until 2013) (2014-2016) (2017-2020) (2021+)

[cm2/Vs]

The values refer to materials that are available in commer-cial quantities and to devices

that are manufactured in high- throughput processes.

Poly-Si

a-Si

Small

mole

cules

,

Precu

rsors,

Polym

ers

NEW

CONC

EPTS

Inorga

nics, N

ano-m

aterial

s

OE-A 2013


There has also been strong progress in materials

for OPV, where power conversion efficiencies

have now gone above 9 %, and 12 % in vacuum-

deposited devices, to be competitive with a-Si.

However, significant work remains in the transla-

tion of small-area, lab-scale cell performance into

the large-area, stable and inexpensive produc-

tion-level modules required on the market. From

a semiconductor perspective, this challenge

requires the development of materials that can

be easily and cost-effectively scaled, and which

can maintain high-power conversion efficiencies

(PCEs) over extended lifetimes when exposed to

real-world environmental conditions.

In addition to organic materials, inorganic semi-

conductors such as ZnO and IZO and new materi-

als such as carbon nanotubes or nanowires are of

growing interest. Recent developments have

shown several semiconductors in these classes

which can be processed from solution as a disper-

sion or precursor or deposited in vacuum or vapor

phase at low temperature. More recently,

graphene, a 2D monatomic sheet of carbon

atoms, has gathered a lot of attention, and

exhibits a number of properties that enable its

potential use as a functional material including

extremely high mobility. It has been explored for

applications in transistors, sensors, transparent

conductors and supercapacitors, among others.

The key challenge for graphene at the moment is

processing while maintaining the extraordinary

physical properties.

Printable conductors may be metallic, metal

oxides, organic or based on carbon nanostruc-

tures. The choice of conducting materials is

strongly dependent on their application. For high

metal-like conductivity it is still necessary to

use filled materials such as silver inks. If conduc-

tivity is needed in combination with high trans-

parency, e.g., for OPV or OLEDs, special inorganic

materials like ITO or the polymeric PEDOT:PSS

represent state of the art solutions. Transparent

organic conductors still show inferior conductivi-

ties in comparison to metal oxides like ITO but

are continuing to improve in performance and

become more competitive. The polymers allow

for wet processing, and the flexibility of the poly-

mer coatings makes them attractive candidates

for the replacement of brittle inorganic materials.

Recently, significant progress has been made on

transparent inorganic conductors, with solution-

processable materials such as carbon nanotubes,

graphene, and nanomaterial based inks (e.g.,

silver nanowires) showing excellent conductivity

and transparency in addition to improved

mechanical properties over ITO.

Printable metallic conductors, which have been

commercial for many years in the form of screen-

printable silver pastes for numerous applications,

have continued to develop, with progress in

nanostructured and precursor inks, replacement

of silver by copper, advances in photonic sinter-

ing, and improvements in formulation that have

enabled stretchable conductive inks (Figure 18).

Carbon inks have seen increased applications,

including temperature sensitive resistors.

Figure 18: Formable and stretchable ink for 3D circuitry. (Source: DuPont)


Dielectrics are passive materials, which are used

in many active and passive devices. Numerous

dielectrics are solution-processable and can be

printed. There are a number of different material

classes that can be used as dielectrics, from ther-

moplastic to thermosetting plastic polymers, and

they can be thermally or UV-curable. The dielec-

tric (e.g., thickness and dielectric constant) can

play an extremely important role in performance

of devices, and this has been extensively studied

in OTFTs, where the dielectric-semiconductor

interface is critical for optimal carrier mobility

and on/off ratio. Significant work on optimal

dielectrics for both p- and n-type OTFTs has been

done, and this has, next to improvements in the

semiconductors, been a significant factor in

improvement of OTFT performance.

Encapsulation materials are often required to

protect organic electronic systems against envi-

ronmental influences to insure sufficient shelf

and operational lifetime. This protection is, for

example, critical for OPV and OLEDs, where highly

reactive metal electrodes may be used, but also

important in other aspects of organic electronics.

In some cases water vapor transmission rates

below 106 g m2 d1 (at 20 C / 50 RH) and oxygen

transmission rates lower than 106 cm3 m2 d1

bar-1 are needed, but the materials need to be

transparent as well for OPV and OLEDs. Encapsu-

lation materials are either passive or active.

Active materials, or getters, are designed to

absorb water or oxygen (typically zeolites, reac-

tive metal oxides) before they can reach and

damage the active device stacks. In combination

with passive materials, they enable shelf and

operational lifetime of currently commercially

available OLED devices. Passive materials include

organic UV or thermally curable adhesives for

edge or monolithic sealing of devices typically

sandwiched between glass or engineered flexible

substrates. Flexible substrates often comprise

planar diffusion barriers, materials include silicon

oxides, silicon nitrides, silicon oxynitrites or

alumina layers. For encapsulations where a

higher transmission rate is possible, e.g., for

OTFTss, it is possible to use polymers filled with

nanoparticles or nanoflakes.

Substrates

Most organic and printed electronics devices

target the use of flexible and potentially low-cost

substrates to enable large area and/or more

rugged products with a higher freedom of design.

Since the device manufacturing process usually

starts with the substrate onto which several lay-

ers of active and passive material are deposited,

the surface needs to be compatible and to guaran-

tee processability in subsequent production steps

OE-A

Gravure Printing

Impression cylinder

Gravure cylinder

Image elements are equally spaced but variable in depth and area

Blade

Ink

OE-A

Ink-jet Printing

Piezo Transducer

Ink Orifice

Substrate

Figure 19: Rotogravure printing process. Figure 20: Screen printing process.

Figure 21: Ink-jet deposition mechanism (piezo).

Screen Printing

Squeegee

Sreen mesh

Ink Frame

Substrate Base plate (stationary) OE-A


and of course functionality in the final applica-

tion. The numerous flexible electronics applica-

tions all have their own specific requirements,

and therefore suitable substrate solutions within

one application group can still differ over a wide

range. In general, glass and metal (stainless steel,

aluminum foil or the like) are still the only

substrates readily available with high and reliable

barrier properties a key requirement for many

applications (OLED lighting, display, organic

photovoltaics). Among the polymer films, the

polyester grades (PET, PEN) are most widely used

today in organic and printed electronics, but also

other polymers, paper, cardboard and textiles

have been utilized in these applications. Plastic

materials like PET, PEN or PC (polycarbonate) can

be tailor-made to adjust physical and surface

properties over a wide range so that they can

serve as all-round solutions. Other plastics like

polyimide (PI), polyethersulfone (PES) or poly-

etheretherketone (PEEK) are specialties and

hence higher priced materials with special advan-

tages like increased heat or chemical stability.

Patterning Processes

A wide range of large-area deposition and

patterning techniques can be used for organic

electronics. Most prominent in this context are

various printing techniques that are well known

from the graphic arts industry and enable reel-

to-reel processing.

Examples of two high-volume printing processes

are rotogravure (Figure 19) and screen (Figure 20).

Other mass printing processes are offset,

lithography or flexography. The lateral resolution

(smallest feature that can be printed) typically

ranges from 20 m to 100 m depending on

process, throughput, substrate and ink proper-

ties. Film thicknesses can range from well under

1 m to tens of m. Each process has its own

strengths, e.g., screen is excellent for stacking

multiple thick films, while gravure combines high

throughput with robust printing forms and can

deliver homogeneous thin films. These printing

processes can have enormous throughput and

low production cost but place demanding

requirements on the functional inks in terms of

properties like viscosity, and cannot correct for

issues like substrate distortion. Mass printing will

be an important production process especially for

applications where large area, high volumes and

low costs are important. Recently, there has been

progress in improving the resolution of mass

printing processes, e.g., through new screen

materials or laser-assisted etching of gravure

forms.

Ink-jet printing (Figure 21) has received growing

interest as a way to deposit functional materials.

As a digital printing process, it enables variable

printing since no printing plate is needed, and

can thus correct in-line for distortion. Ink-jet

printing head developers have continued to

develop finer and finer printing heads, which are

Figure 22: Throughput vs. feature size for a range of typical production processes.

Hig

h (>

1)M

ediu

m(0

.01-

1)

Thro

ugh

put

(m2 /

s)

Minimum feature size (m)

1 10 100 500

Gravure

Flexo

Low

( 50 m)

100

1

10-2

10-4

OE-A 2013

Xerography

Throughput vs. Feature Size for Typical Production Processes

Offset

Screen

Laser ablationR2R

PhotoLitho-graphyR2R

Ink-jet


starting to enable features on the order of a few

m, and throughput is improving with the devel-

opment of multi-head printers. Recently, aerosol-

jet printing has also received a lot of attention,

and super ink-jet printing, a related process, has

claimed ability to get to micron features without

pre-patterning the substrate. Progress in increas-

ing the resolution and registration of printing

processes will be a critical step to dimensional

scaling of organic electronics, which could be of

similar importance to the scaling of photolitho-

graphy processes for silicon electronics, the

driving force behind Moores Law.

Related to volume printing are unpatterned

solution coating techniques such as slot-die or

wire bar coating. Slot-die coating in particular

has gathered significant interest, because it can

be non-contact, pre-metered and work with a

sealed system, which is useful especially for

solvent-based materials. Slot-die coating can

operate in either bead/meniscus mode or in

curtain mode.

Laser ablation, laser induced forward transfer,

large area vacuum deposition, soft lithography

and large area photolithography are further

patterning and deposition techniques. Some of

these processes are subtractive, i.e., involve

removing unwanted material from a large area

unpatterned film, while others are additive, i.e.,

only deposit material where it is wanted. Sub-m

patterning techniques such as nanoimprint

lithography and microcontact printing have

gained a good deal of attention recently but are

still primarily used in research. Pad printing, hot

stamping, xerography and surface energy

patterning are also receiving substantial atten-

tion. Each method has its individual strengths,

and in general, processes with a higher resolution

have a smaller throughput, though there has

been some progress in this area (Figure 22).

There are no single standard processes in exis-

tence today. Deciding which printing or other pat-

terning process is used depends on the specific

requirements of a particular device. In general,

different processes have to be used for subse-

quent steps of a multilayer device in order to

optimize each process step. The above mentioned

processes differ strongly with regard to e.g., reso-

lution and throughput, and one system may

require some high-throughput steps followed by

high resolution processes, e.g., deposition of large

amounts of material using coating or mass print-

ing followed by fine patterning of a small portion

of the surface using laser ablation.

Process Technology Levels

The technologies that are used in organic elec-

tronics range from batch, clean-room, etching-

based processes to mass printing processes that

are capable of deposition of square meters of

substrates per second. Here is a rough classifica-

tion of the technologies in three different tech-

nology levels:

The wafer level technology includes batch pro-

cessing, typically film substrates on a carrier. An

adapted semiconductor line is used for process-

ing. High resolution can be achieved by vacuum

deposition and/or spin coating followed by

photolithography and wet or dry etching. The

production cost is relatively high and the process

is not compatible for conversion to in-line sheet-

to-sheet or reel-to-reel processes.

Under hybrid technologies, we summarize com-

binations of processes including large-area pho-

tolithography, screen printing or printed circuit

board (PCB) technologies that make use of flex-

ible substrates (e.g., polymer films or paper).

Deposition of materials is achieved by spin coat-

ing, blade coating or large-area vacuum deposi-

tion, in some cases also partly by printing. Ink-jet

printing and laser patterning are further technol-

ogies that are grouped in the hybrids and enable

production at a medium cost level. At the

moment, hybrid appears to be possibly the most

promising technology for further market penetra-

tion in the next few years, and it could also be

combined with some amount of silicon for

specific functions in heterogeneous integration.

Fully printed means continuous, automated

mass-production compatible printing and coat-

ing techniques (flexo, gravure, offset, slot-die,

etc.), flexible substrates and reel-to-reel technol-

ogy (Figure 23). Although all-printed devices do

not yet show as high resolution or performance

as those made using wafer or hybrid processes,

mass printing has great potential for very low

cost production and will be able to deliver

extremely large numbers of products. At the

same time it requires significant volumes of

materials even for trials, and will need large-

volume applications to properly utilize such high-

throughput equipment.


Key Technology Parameters

The detailed application parameter specifications

for the different applications and product genera-

tions help define the requirements that have to

be fulfilled from technology side. The technology

parameters are more fundamental and describe

fundamental material, device or process proper-

ties. As with the application parameters, we only

list a small excerpt of the key technology param-

eters identified for the various applications,

focusing on those that are relevant to a number

of applications. As was the case with application

parameters, the same key things are important

as in the last edition.

Mobility / electrical performance (threshold

voltage, on/off current)

The performance (operating frequency, current

driving capacity) of the circuits depends on the

charge carrier mobility of the semiconductor,

the conductivity of the conductor and the

dielectric behavior of the dielectric materials.

Resolution / registration

The performance (operating frequency, current

driving capacity) and reliability of the circuits

depend on the lateral distance of the elec-

trodes (resolution) within the devices (e.g.,

transistors) and the overlay accuracy (registra-

tion) between different patterned layers.

Barrier properties / environmental stability

The lifetime depends on a combination of the

sensitivity of the materials and devices to

oxygen and moisture and the barrier properties

of protective layers, substrates and sealants

against oxygen and moisture. The necessary

barrier properties vary for the different applica-

tions over several orders of magnitude.

Flexibility / bending radius

Thin form factors and flexibility of the devices

are key advantages of organic electronics. In

order to achieve reliable flexibility and even

rollable devices, materials, design and process

have to be chosen carefully.

Fit of process parameters (speed, temperature,

solvents, ambient conditions, vacuum, inert

gas atmosphere)

In order to have a sufficient working system, it

is important to adjust the parameters of the

different materials and devices used to build

organic electronics.

Yield

Low-cost electronics in high volumes are only

possible when the processes allow production

at high yields. This includes safe processes,

adjusted materials and circuit designs as well

as an in-line quality control.

Figure 23: Reel-to-reel printing of electronic devices. (Source: 3D-Micromac)


Principle Challenges

One goal of the roadmap is to identify red brick

walls principle challenges that can only be over-

come by major breakthroughs beyond the expec-

tations of standard technology development. For

each application, the requirements for product

generations were compared with expected tech-

nology development and the key challenges were

identified and discussed. Like the key application

and technology parameters, the red brick walls

may vary for the different applications. Those

discussed below are valid for all applications and

summarize the most important ones.

A common feature of all future generations of

the different products is that the complexity and

overall size of logic circuits is increasing. In

certain cases, the applications include millions of

transistors, other combine various different elec-

tronic devices like circuit, power supply, sensors,

displays and switches. In the future, more and

more higher and higher performance compo-

nents will have to be fit into smaller and smaller

areas, which for other applications high-perfor-

mance components will have to be placed pre-

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