VVFS-55 November 2010 - Veritas et Visus · Veritas et Visus November 2010 Vol 6 No 5. Veritas et Visus ... Haruna; K-Solar 3G Technologies; Pidilite Innovation Centre; PJI Contract;

Table of Contents

VTT, 33 Merck, p39 Textile Testing, p36 University of Michigan, p52

Letter from the publisher: Flexible minds… by Mark Fihn 2

News from around the world 3

Conference summaries 15

Electronics Conference & Exhibition, October 19-21, 2010, Dresden, Germany 15

OLEDs World Summit, September 27-29, 2010, San Francisco, California 18

IMI Ink Jet Technological Showcase, September 8-9, 2010, Baltimore, Maryland 23

Organic and Large Area Electronics Meeting, June 14-15, 2010, Brussels, Belgium 25

LOPE-C, May 31-June 2, 2010, Frankfurt, Germany 29

Smart Fabrics, April 14-16, 2010, Miami, Florida 36

FINETECH JAPAN, April 14-16, 2010, Tokyo, Japan 39

Flexible Electronics & Displays Conference, February 1-4, 2010, Phoenix, Arizona 42

IDW ’09, December 9-11, 2009, Miyazaki, Japan 47

Printed Electronics USA, December 1-4, 2009, San Jose, California 50

Paper Electronics by Peter Harrop 54

OLEDs and ITO: Will there be a falling 0ut? by Lawrence Gasman 57

The Last Word: In vino veritas…by Chris Williams 61

Display Industry Calendar 63

The Flexible Substrate is focused on bringing news and commentary about the activities of the companies and

technologies related to the development of flexible substrates for the displays industry. The Flexible Substrate is published electronically 10 times annually by Veritas et Visus, 3305 Chelsea Place, Temple, Texas, USA, 76502. Phone: +1 254 791 0603. http://www.veritasetvisus.com

Publisher & Editor-in-Chief Mark Fihn [email protected] Managing Editor Phillip Hill [email protected] Contributors: Lawrence Gasman, Peter Harrop, and Chris Williams

Subscription rate: US$47.99 annually. Single issues: US$7.99 each. Hard copy subscriptions are available upon request, at a rate based on location and mailing method. Copyright 2010 by Veritas et Visus. All rights reserved. Veritas et Visus disclaims any proprietary interest in the trademarks or names of others.

Flexible Substrate Veritas et Visus November 2010 Vol 6 No 5

Veritas et Visus Flexible Substrate November 2010

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Flexible minds…

by Mark Fihn

The Veritas et Visus newsletters are an amalgamation of many aspects of the display industry and its associated technologies and markets. While we call our output a “newsletter”, we are in fact much more than just a simple regurgitation of the news of the day. One of the keys to our publication is the perspectives we routinely publish from experts in the field, providing a broad and diverse body of content and ideas.

To date, 47 people have contributed articles to the Flexible Substrate – many have contributed repeatedly. We occasionally publish one of our MultiView newsletters to focus on a particular author. From the listing below, we’ve published MultiView newsletters featuring the collected contributions we’ve received for all of our newsletters from Chris Williams, Alfred Poor, and Geoff Walker. Certainly, many of the names listed below are known to those of you active in the display industry.

Contributors to the Flexible Substrate

In addition to contributed articles from industry experts, we routinely interview industry personalities about their efforts to address the creation and adoption of flexible display and other flexible electronics technologies. We separately publish our Twenty Interviews composite newsletter as a way to enable readers to see into the minds of these creative leaders in the display industry. Here’s a list of the interviewees that we’ve conducted to date:

Interviews published in the Flexible Substrate

The combined experience and wisdom that we’ve published about the ever-expanding market for flexible display solutions and related technologies over the years is substantial – relying tremendously on those who are actively involved in the industry. We intend to continue to feature expert contributions and targeted interviews as a way to bring our readers a more comprehensive view of the industry. If you are interested in participating in our publication, don’t hesitate to let us know…


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News from around the world compiled by Mark Fihn and Phillip Hill

Armstrong World Industries and Universal Display demonstrate white OLED lighting ceiling system Armstrong World Industries and Universal Display Corporation announced that the companies have demonstrated a novel white phosphorescent OLED lighting system to the US Department of Energy (DOE) in connection with the successful completion of their $1.9 million, two-year, Solid State Lighting Product Program titled “Development of High Efficacy, Low Cost Phosphorescent OLED Lighting Ceiling Luminaire System”. This demonstration is a critical step toward the commercialization of efficient, low-cost lighting systems for commercial applications. Universal Display’s novel luminaire system is energy-efficient, has low-cost potential and is also aesthetically pleasing. Integrated into Armstrong’s TechZone ceiling system, each luminaire, consisting of four 15x15cm PHOLED lamps, easily snaps into Armstrong’s modular structure for highly utilitarian functionality, as shown in the photograph below.

Universal Display PHOLED lighting luminaires mounted in an Armstrong World Industries TechZone ceiling system. Each

luminaire is comprised of four 15x15cm lighting panels mounted in outcoupling enhancement lenses.

The PHOLED luminaire used in the Armstrong TechZone System has overall dimensions of approximately 15x60cm. Each of the four lamps in the luminaire consists of a PHOLED lighting panel, an outcoupling enhancement lens and a mounting frame. Using Universal Display’s highly-efficient PHOLED technology and materials, each panel offers a record 58lm/W, which translates into a luminaire efficacy calculated to be 51lm/W. It has been estimated that by 2016, white OLEDs could generate well over $20 billion in worldwide savings of electricity costs and could save over nine million metric tons of carbon emissions from the US alone. Universal Display is working under several DOE-funded programs to advance energy-efficient white OLED lighting. http://www.armstrong.com http://www.universaldisplay.com

Plextronics announces availability of printable OLED material for ink-jets in 2011 Plextronics announced that its Plexcore OC NQ ink is now available for limited sampling, with more broad availability expected in 2011. The non-aqueous-based hole injection layer (HIL) ink augments the company’s existing aqueous-based HIL, and is geared specifically for solution processable phosphorescent OLED emitters. The company also expects to introduce ink-jet (printable) inks for limited sampling early in 2011. This is a major step for large and cheap OLED television panels by end 2011. The ability to solution process OLEDs, especially displays, is a fundamental hurdle that the industry needs to overcome in order to more broadly commercialize OLED technology. Early sampling of Plexcore OC NQ assisted UDC to achieve low voltage and long lifetime in recent performance testing of their “P2OLED” solution-processed, phosphorescent OLED technology. In October, UDC issued a press release announcing significant advances in the performance of its Universal P2OLED solution-processable, phosphorescent OLED material systems. Plextronics was the HIL provider, and its Plexcore OC NQ ink helped UDC to achieve a lower operating voltage and a boost in lifetime over previously disclosed results. The company reported on a new green P2OLED system with 66cd/A and 130,000 hours of operating lifetime to 50% of an initial luminance of 1000 nits – representing approximately a two times improvement in luminous efficiency and lifetime over UDC’s results reported a year ago. http://www.plextronics.com

Toshiba puts OLED displays on hold Toshiba is putting OLED display production on hold and will concentrate on LCD screens instead. Toshiba and Panasonic had both worked on building an OLED production factory in Japan. “The plan is currently frozen. We’ll review the production plan again from scratch,” a Toshiba mobile display spokesman told the Nikkei business


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daily. Both Toshiba and Panasonic spent £121 million back in 2008. At the time Toshiba made pronouncements about bundling more expensive but much brighter OLED screens into its own hardware and for other vendors. The company had plans to put out OLED displays for smart phones, TVs and monitors. Toshiba even had plans for an array of its own OLED TVs. OLED screens have only found niche outlets and haven’t gone mass market yet.

IMEC smart textile PASTA project aims at functional LED PV fabrics IMEC and its project partners have launched the European FP7 (Framework Program) project PASTA (Integrating Platform for Advanced Smart textile Applications) to develop large-area smart textiles. Large-area manufacturability is an essential aspect in bridging the gap between lab prototyping and the industrial manufacturing of smart textiles for sports and leisure wear, technical textiles for safety and monitoring applications, and textiles for healthcare monitoring purposes. Four applications areas will be addressed by the project. For outdoor sports and leisure wear, luminous (LEDs, OLEDs and other light sources) textiles with integrated photovoltaic (PV) cells will be developed. Moreover, washability will be addressed, as this is an essential aspect of intelligent clothes. PASTA will also explore a bed linen application with an integrated sensor to monitor humidity and signal excessive humidity due to bed-wetting. Two home-textile safety applications will be addressed by integration of building evacuation markings using LEDs. And last, a fabric will be developed which allows non-destructive in-situ monitoring of accumulated stress in composites to predict the residual life-time and to indicate damage of industrial components.

The PASTA project will combine research on electronic packaging and interconnection technology with textile research. By introducing new concepts for electronic packaging and module interconnects, a seamless, more comfortable and more robust integration of electronics in textiles will be possible, says IMEC. The main technological developments will concentrate on a new concept for bare die integration into a yarn (by means of micromachining), a new interconnect technology based on mechanical crimping, and the development of a stretchable interposer serving as a stress relief interface between the rigid component and the elastic fabric. The proposed solutions for integration of electronics in textile will cover a whole range of components, from ultra-small LEDs to complex multichip modules. Moreover, a system design task will tackle the power distribution and system partitioning aspects to provide a complete solution for integration of a distributed sensor/actuator system in fabric.

PASTA is a 4-year project, coordinated by IMEC, and will build on the results of the STELLA project (FP6) and the extensive textile know-how in the consortium. Industrial as well as academic players will bring their expertise to the project: project partners are IMEC (Belgium), CEA (Commissariat à l’Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives), PEP (Association Pôle Européen de Plasturgie), Sport Soie SAS (France), Fraunhofer IZM, STFI (Sächsisches Textilforschungsinstitut), ETTLIN Spinnerei und Weberei Produktions GmbH & Co KG, Peppermint Holding GmbH (Germany) and CSEM - Centre Suisse d'Electronique et de Microtechnique (Switzerland). http://www2.imec.be/be_en/press/imec-news/pastaproject.html

A*STAR SIMTech launches nanotechnology manufacturing initiative The Singapore Institute of Manufacturing Technology (SIMTech), a research institute of the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR), launched the Nanotechnology in Manufacturing Initiative (NiMI). This initiative explores nanomaterials for industry applications and addresses challenges in the adoption of nanotechnology for manufacturing. Thirteen companies in the areas of coating, instrumentation, materials, clean energy, testing, inspection and certification are now members of the initiative: 3M; CEL Coatings; Gaia Science; Haruna; K-Solar 3G Technologies; Pidilite Innovation Centre; PJI Contract; Shimadzu; Sunny Instruments Singapore; Toray Industries Inc; TUV SUD PSB; Vestas Technology R&D; and Wangi Industrial are participating in the initiative. SIMTech has integrated nanotechnology in its research activities in manufacturing technologies. These encompass machining, joining, forming, and surface functionalities, as well as characterization. Some examples are laser fabrication and nanobump arrays, lead-free nanofillers solder composite, powder injection molding with nano-size fillers, superhard nanocomposite PVD coating and photocatalytic titanium dioxide nanoparticles coating. http://www.SIMTech.a-star.edu.sg


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RUSNANO and Plastic Logic announce agreement to establish new plastic electronics production in Russia The Russian Corporation of Nanotechnologies (RUSNANO) and Plastic Logic announced they have entered into an agreement to create Plastic Logic’s second volume production facility for its next-generation plastic electronic displays and establish a plastic electronics industry in Russia. Under the terms of agreement RUSNANO intends to make a significant investment in the company as part of a large-scale investment project. Plastic Logic said it will continue to house its core R&D facility in Cambridge, England, as well as maintain its commercial factory in Dresden, Germany and corporate headquarters in Mountain View, California. Plastic Logic’s first application of the technology makes possible a thin, lightweight, robust and flexible active matrix display. The display is at the core of Plastic Logic’s first commercial consumer electronics product, a next-generation electronic reader for business that is currently under development. “The production facility for the next generation of plastic displays will become the first step to establish the new branch of an electronics industry in Russia. By the time of the launch, the Russian facility will be the world’s most advanced fabrication plant in the plastic electronics industry,” said RUSNANO managing director Georgy Kolpachev. http://PlasticLogic.com http://www.rusnano.com

Samsung shows printed-out 19-inch AMOLED TV Samsung showed off a prototype TV set that uses a printed 19-inch AMOLED panel. The screen's resolution is 960x540, and it has a resolution of 58ppi, while brightness is set at 200cd/m2. Samsung didn’t give an estimated production date, saying only that the technology is still being developed. The TV on display was capable of showing 16.77 million colors with an eight-bit color scale and covered 62% of the color gamut. The printed AMOLED technology is making headway, as Seiko showed a 14-inch OLED panel in May of last year using a similar inkjet method with a resolution of 60ppi, a six-bit color scale and a 100cd/m2 luminance. Samsung has also showed off a 31-inch AMOLED TV prototype earlier this year and may bring out a 42-inch AMOLED set late in 2011, though neither is made using the inkjet printing method. http://www.samsung.com

Excise tax for thin touch-panel glass substrates exempted in Taiwan In order to support industrial development, Taiwan’s Ministry of Finance has agreed to exempt the 10% excise tax for glass substrates that are used for touch panels thinner than 1.1mm in thickness. Touch panel makers indicated that exemption of the 10% excise tax will help to lower production costs and further establish Taiwan’s position in the overall touch panel supply chain as materials account for up to 65-70% of the total production cost of a touch panel, and glass substrates account for about half of the materials costs.

Cambrios Technologies and Plextronics collaborate on improvements to OLED-based solid-state lighting

Cambrios Technologies Corporation and Plextronics Inc. announced that they have entered into collaboration to develop a cost-effective, high performance material that could improve the manufacturing process and quality of lighting products based on OLEDs. The collaboration is funded, in part, through an assistance agreement with the Department of Energy (DOE) Solid State Lighting (SSL) program. In the project, Plextronics’ proprietary Plexcore OC material, which functions as a key component of OLEDs known as the hole injection layer (HIL), will be applied on top of Cambrios’ proprietary ClearOhm material that creates a transparent electrode to form a transparent conducting hole injection (TCHI) electrode. Lighting accounts for a significant amount of energy consumption in today’s world. In 2001, lighting amounted to more than 20% of the total electricity in the US. Solid-state lighting is widely expected to provide higher efficiency light sources, while eventually moving to a much lower cost. OLEDs could potentially be the lowest cost solution to high efficiency lighting. Steady progress toward commercialization has been made in recent years. The use of traditional transparent conductors is expected to be a major impediment for broad adoption of OLED-based, solid-state lighting due to cost, and therefore, the industry is actively seeking alternatives that are based on high-throughput, low-temperature manufacturing processes. http://www.plextronics.com


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ITRI wins award for its FlexUPD technology Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) has won the Overall Gold 2010 Wall Street Journal Technology Innovation Award for its FlexUPD. The paper-thin, low-cost and flexible flat display allows for two-sided surface visibility and can be manufactured inexpensively. The FlexUPD is technologically compatible with current LCD production lines. Only the de-bonding equipment needs to be added to LCD manufacturing facilities for FlexUPD. The photo is a 6-inch color flexible AMOLED e-paper made with FlexUPD technology. The OLED display is just 0.1mm thick with a folding radius of 5cm or less. Brightness is 150cd/m2. The flexible e-paper can be scrolled up to 15,000 times. FlexUPD enables the removal of the flexible portion of the panel after all of the typical processing has been completed on a glass substrate. A foldable Bluetooth OLED keyboard could be incorporated. http://www.itri.org.tw/eng

Displaybank brings out graphene key patent analysis Displaybank’s latest report studies and analyzes graphene technology patents registered in Korea, US, Japan, and Europe by August 20, 2010. Of 891 items of raw data, valid patents correspond to graphene manufacturing technology and graphene application devices. The graphene manufacturing technology is divided into graphene synthesis, graphene film, and graphene complexes. The graphene application device section is divided into energy device, display device, electronic device, and BT related device. Graphene is expected to be widely applied since it has high carbon-chemical stability and electroconductivity. Physical properties that have been discovered until now as well as those one to be newly discovered are to be used as basic science R&D and potential applied R&D materials. In addition, an economic technology which is able to mass produce graphene on large areas is needed in order to realize the application potential. http://www.displaybank.com

Patent application status by technology/country

Corning expands line of slim LCD glass substrates Corning Incorporated announced the commercial availability of EAGLE XG Slim glass substrates in larger generation sizes to support LCD panel manufacturing for larger applications like TV and large monitors. Initially intended to enable lighter-weight portable devices, the EAGLE XG Slim line debuted in June with glass sizes up to Generation 5 at 0.4mm thick. The announcement adds 0.5mm glass in Generations 7 and 8 – the glass sizes that support television applications and large monitors. Until now, those generation sizes have traditionally been 0.7mm thick. At the standard glass thickness of 0.7mm, glass represents 10% to 25% of the module thickness for leading-edge slim TV designs. A migration to 0.5mm will provide a tangible benefit in efforts to reduce the thickness of televisions. Corning plans to further expand the EAGLE XG Slim product line by developing 0.3mm substrates for glass sizes that support portable electronic devices. http://www.corning.com

SouthWest NanoTechnologies presents research paper on conductive carbon nanotube inks SouthWest NanoTechnologies, a leader in high quality, single-wall and specialty multi-wall carbon nanotubes (CNT), presented performance data on its new conductive carbon nanotube inks. SWeNT’s CNT inks, based on V2V ink technology developed by alliance partner Chasm Technologies can be printed using commercial, high-volume printing methods and equipment, including flexographic, gravure and screen printing. This breakthrough ink technology, combined with SWeNT’s unique ability to tailor the synthesis of CNT materials for applications (using its patented CoMoCAT process) will enable customers to print large area, low-cost devices for a wide range of applications including energy-efficient lighting, affordable photovoltaics, improved energy storage and printed electronics. http://www.swentnano.com


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Thinfilm works with PARC to develop next-generation printed memory solutions Thinfilm, a provider of advanced printed memory technology, and PARC (Palo Alto Research Center Incorporated) announced that they are working together to provide next-generation memory technology enabled through printed electronics. An essential element of most electronics devices, memory is required for identification, tracking status and history, information storage, and more. Thinfilm is commercializing fully printed, rewritable memory for application in specific markets, including toys and games, and is developing contact-based memory arrays for higher-capacity applications. Combining Thinfilm’s memory products with PARC’s printed thin-film transistor technology will allow the development of integrated systems as part of Thinfilm’s product roadmap. IDTechEx expects the Printed Electronics market to grow to more than $50 billion over the next ten years, with logic (memory and transistors) representing the largest segment. Using printing to manufacture electronic memory minimizes the number of process steps, which in turn dramatically reduces manufacturing costs and lowers the environmental impact compared to traditional semiconductor processes. Target markets for Thinfilm memory products include RFID tags, sensor tags, and disposable price labels. http://www.thinfilm.se

Toppan Printing demonstrates credit cards with color screens Toppan Printing has demonstrated a credit card with a color screen and keypad, claiming that you don’t need a mobile phone to manage mobile commerce. The card is 3.9mm thick and has a 2.2-inch color screen with a 320x240 resolution. It will cost under $25 when production ramps up next year. N-Mark (the standard formerly known as NFC) combines a battery-powered tag reader with an induction-powered tag. So if the in-built battery runs out, the card will still work. Toppan's card can do a lot more than take a PIN. One could use it to control the level of transaction to be authorized automatically, or control which of the multiple payment schemes that could be installed should be used by default. http://www.toppan.co.jp/english

NovaCentrix patents sintering metal inks on low-temperature substrates NovaCentrix has been awarded US Patent #7,820,097, titled “Electrical, Plating and Catalytic Uses of Metal Nanomaterial Compositions”, which covers in part the use of flash lamps to sinter metal-based inks and materials on low-temperature substrates such as paper and plastic and includes high-speed and roll-to-roll processing. This process is critical to the advancement of innovative new products in photovoltaics, displays, RFID, sensors, batteries, capacitors, and smart packaging. “One of the most exciting aspects of this technology is its scalability and economy. Inexpensive flexible substrates can now be used. Furthermore, processing can be performed at hundreds of feet per minute in a roll-to-roll environment,” said Dr. Kurt Schroder, chief scientist and lead patent author. “In

addition to processing silver, gold, and nickel used in conductive inks, the high speed the process can sinter easily- oxidized particles such as copper in an ambient air environment, thus eliminating the need for a reduction furnace or inert atmosphere. This room-temperature process enables truly inexpensive conductive traces for printed electronics.” PulseForge tools use the photonic curing process to heat thin films on low temperature substrates using novel flash lamp and power supply technology to deliver continuously adjustable, megawatt intensity, microsecond resolution pulses of broad-spectrum light. Unlike traditional oven technologies, the transient nature of the patented process heats thin films to a high temperature on low-temperature substrates, such as polymers, without causing damage. By adjusting the pulse attributes using the touch-screen interface, temperature profiles in the film and substrate can be closely controlled and optimized for drying, sintering, annealing, and modulating chemical reactions in thin films to achieve high-performance properties at high-speed roll-to-roll processing rates. http://www.novacentrix.com


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Wake Forest University develops super-thin, cool light source Researchers at Wake Forest University’s Center for Nanotechnology and Molecular Materials have developed an inexpensive new light source that’s cool to the touch, won’t break if dropped, and can be molded into any shape. A spin-off company from Wake Forest, PureLux has attracted $2 million in venture capital to bring the technology to market. Wake Forest founded PureLux in 2007 to commercialize the advanced lighting technology developed at its Nanotech Center. The company has begun to ready the technology for real-world applications – from backlighting on e-books and self-illuminating street signs to work surfaces that light up and replace lighting fixtures in office spaces. The PureLux device uses nanotechnology to produce visible light directly; other solutions create light as a by-product of heating a filament or gas. Unlike other new lighting solutions such as compact fluorescents, PureLux technology requires no warm-up period. Because they are made of moldable plastic, PureLux lights can be used in multiple settings, from homes to commercial buildings. http://www.wfu.edu

E Ink announces color e-paper E Ink Holdings Inc. announced the release of its next generation display technology, E Ink Triton. Triton enables color e-paper solutions, enhancing the visual experience for e-publishing markets. For image-rich information

applications showing charts, graphs, maps, photos, comics and advertising, color displays made with Triton imaging film enable ultra-low power and high mobility devices with a paper-like experience. In addition to 16 levels of grayscale, Triton is capable of displaying thousands of colors. And just like E Ink’s grayscale e-paper products, Triton’s crisp text and detailed color graphics are fully viewable in direct sunlight. Displays made with Triton, as well as the recently launched Pearl, can perform up to 20% faster than those made with previous generations of E Ink imaging film. The E Ink Triton design leverages the patented two pigment capsule platform found in millions of E Ink enabled eBooks. This technology offers unparalleled image stability; pictures and text can be maintained on the screen even when the power is turned off. http://www.eink.com

3M invests in Printechnologics of Germany 3M has invested in Printechnologics, a German printed electronics specialist, aimed at joint efforts for providing innovative solutions for electronic circuitry on paper or foil. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Printechnologics has developed game changing technology enabling printed circuit structures on paper. We see various innovative application areas that provide significant growth opportunities and access to new markets for 3M, a spokesman said. Printechnologics developed custom alterations to conventional printing methods with extremely high scalability and cost advantages to address mass markets. The technologies can facilitate a broad range of solutions across B2B and B2C channels. This opens significant global market potential. Possible applications are smart packaging to prevent counterfeiting or anti-fraud solutions in the gaming market in connection with multi-touch displays. http://www.3m.com http://www.printechnologics.com

UK Technology Strategy Board announces £18M competition To stimulate innovation the UK’s Technology Strategy Board has allocated up to £18M to invest in collaborative research and development projects. The core technology areas covered by this competition are: advanced materials; biosciences; electronics, photonics and electrical systems; high value manufacturing; information and communications technology; and nanotechnology. The Technology Strategy Board are looking to fund applied research projects attracting 50% public funding and it is expected that £250K-£500K will be invested per project although projects outside this range will be considered. Projects will normally last two to three years and should deliver a tangible outcome such as a system or process demonstrator. The second stage for invited applications will open on 13 December 2010 and close on 27 January 2011. https://ktn.innovateuk.org


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3M unveils polymer film to protect flexible solar panels from water 3M unveiled a plastic film that it says can rival glass in its ability to protect the active materials in solar cells from the elements and save money for manufacturers and their customers. The protective film is a multilayer, fluoropolymer-based sheet that can replace glass as the protective front cover of solar panels. Manufacturers laminate the sheets onto the solar panels to seal them tight and shield them from moisture and other weather elements that can be deadly to the solar cells inside. The film is 3M’s answer to demand by solar-panel makers – particularly manufacturers of certain thin-film solar cells – for an alternative to glass.

Glass has been the armor of choice because it’s cheap, weather-resistant, and durable enough to last decades. The vast majority of the solar panels made today rely on glass as the top cover. But glass also adds weight and bulk to solar panels, and it must be packaged carefully to keep it from breaking, adding to shipping costs. By replacing glass, the new film can do away with the need for supporting racks, which is particularly useful on roofs that can’t bear a lot of weight. Blending solar panels into roofs also can overcome aesthetic objections by homeowners. The result is a plastic film that is 23 micrometers thick, much thinner than the 3,000-micrometer glass typically found

on solar panels today. The company uses fluoro-polymer because the material doesn’t allow water to seep through easily, and it is resistant to high temperatures and ultraviolet radiation. 3M also engineered the film to prevent it from reflecting much sunlight. 3M says its film can achieve water vapor transmission rates of less than 0.0005 grams of water per square meter per day. Other front barrier films can let in hundreds of times more moisture. The film can be laminated in the same roll-to-roll process used to deposit thin-film semiconductors, and that can shave production costs. Flexible solar panels also can be larger than glass panels because the flexible variety doesn’t require the support of a racking system and can be easier to transport. The time and costs for assembling an array of large panels can be significantly less than putting together many small panels. 3M is making the film at a pilot production line and plans to mass-produce it next year. http://www.3m.com

Solar protection: this polymer film seals out water far better than other plastics – it can protect solar panels for decades

NanoMarkets report puts OLED lighting materials sales at $1.4 billion by 2015 According to a new report from industry analyst firm NanoMarkets, the market for materials used in OLED lighting will generate almost $1.4 billion in 2015. The report, “OLED Lighting Materials Market Trends and Impact” is the next in a series from NanoMarkets that examines the commercial opportunities arising from the emerging OLED lighting market. Among the various electronics materials used in OLED lighting stacks, electron transport layer (ETL) materials will contribute the largest revenues with $370 million in sales in 2015. Many ETL materials including carbon nanotubes are currently being tried out by the industry. Sales of emissive layer materials for OLED lighting are expected to reach almost $210 million by 2015. This is an area that has become widely protected by patents by many of the active suppliers. Substrates and encapsulation will together account for almost 20 percent of the OLED lighting materials market in 2015. NanoMarkets believes that in the next decade there will be steady growth in the use of plastic film and flexible glass substrates for OLED lighting, as well as flexible encapsulation systems. This will reflect the inexorable trend towards R2R manufacturing that has already begun.

This report analyzes and quantifies the opportunities that OLED lighting will create for materials suppliers. It sets out the key factors for success in this space, as well as what OLED materials developments will mean to the lighting industry and firms that make relevant manufacturing equipment. The report also examines the latest developments in OLED lighting materials and contains detailed forecasts broken out by type and functionality, as well as the kind of OLED lighting they will be used in. Finally, the report analyzes the emerging supply structure in the OLED materials sector indicating the companies to watch in this space and who the likely winners and losers will be. http://www.nanomarkets.net


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New NanoMarkets report puts thin-film PV substrate and encapsulation market at $1.3 billion by 2015 A new report from industry analyst firm NanoMarkets says that, while glass will continue to dominate substrate and encapsulation materials used for thin-film photovoltaics (TFPV), new materials including metal foils, plastics, ceramics and composites will grow rapidly in importance. The main driver for using these new materials will be the need to support flexible PV in order to reduce PV panel costs using R2R processes and the rise of intrinsically flexible products; notably those used for building-integrated PV (BIPV). In total, the TFPV substrate/encapsulation market is expected to reach $1.3 billion by 2015, going on to reach $1.8 billion by 2017. And while some of the most advanced encapsulation systems have proved difficult to develop and come with a high cost, NanoMarkets has identified several areas where these systems are beginning to make economic sense, most notably in the CIGS sector. The NanoMarkets report notes that, despite their decline in overall market share, glass makers can still expect opportunities to emerge for them. Thus new flexible glasses will be able to participate in the growing sector of the TFPV market that uses R2R processes. In addition, the report suggests that glass will continue to own the highest-performing, “utility-grade” TFPV panels for both encapsulation and substrate purposes. That said, NanoMarkets believes that the TFPV market is seeking new materials, such as low-cost thermally resistant plastics and lower cost dyadic encapsulation systems that will serve as key enabling technologies for BIPV and mobile PV products. It claims that these new materials ultimately have opportunities that go well beyond the PV space, in flexible displays and flexible lighting, for example. Covered in the report are all the major inorganic TFPV markets, thin-film silicon, CdTe and CIGS. Revenue opportunities for a variety of materials as both substrates and encapsulants are discussed in detail and the report also examines what the latest economic and renewable energy policy trends will mean for firms supplying substrates and encapsulation materials to the TFPV sector. The report also contains detailed eight-year forecasts of TFPV substrate and encapsulant materials broken out by TFPV technology and materials type. http://www.nanomarkets.net

National Academies conference highlights synthesis of nanomaterials in flexible manufacturing Flexible electronics represents an area for sustainable economic growth in the US as emerging consumer products seek to find competitive advantages through reduced materials and manufacturing costs along with higher throughput production platforms. As an example, high rate, large area, roll-to-roll manufacturing has been a cornerstone of US innovation and global competitiveness for many years, most notably for the coatings and printing industries. The opportunity now exists to enable value added manufacturing capabilities through the incorporation of emerging nanomaterials and nano manufacturing approaches with these platforms. While significant challenges exist to transition production lines to address emerging markets, investment in these

strategies will provide benefits in terms of economic growth, jobs, and other US interests including security. Recently, the National Academies held a one-day conference on Flexible Electronics for Security, Manufacturing, and Growth underscoring the impact of flexible electronics and manufacturing on national and global competitiveness. From a technology standpoint, roll-to-roll processes and similar print and coating methods are presently being explored for applications including batteries and energy storage, solar photovoltaics, flexible displays, lighting, and electronics. In most cases, design and fabrication modifications are necessary in order to make the process compatible with the flexible substrate material, which usually includes thermal, mechanical, and chemical considerations. In terms of implementation of specific nanomaterials,

transparent electrodes for displays and solar photovoltaics are a prime example. Several nanomaterials have been developed and made commercially available, including silver nanoparticle and carbon nanotube inks, which have additionally been demonstrated as coatings via roll-to-roll processes. Recently, Bae et.al. have demonstrated the growth of large area graphene films surpassing the industry standards for transparent electrodes and subsequent dry transfer process via roll-to-roll production techniques. As another example, solution-based approaches that have previously been demonstrated for fabricating nanostructured carbon for battery and supercapacitor electrodes are now being scaled to flexible substrate and roll-to-roll process platforms. http://www.nationalacademies.org


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UDC delivers wrist-mounted flexible phosphorescent OLED display prototypes to US Army Universal Display Corporation announced that the company has delivered eight novel wrist-mounted phosphorescent OLED displays built on thin flexible metal foil to the US Army Communication Electronics Research and Development Engineering Center’s (CERDEC). The prototype wrist-mounted flexible OLED display devices were designed and built as part of a US Department of Defense (DOD) funded program to develop a thin, lightweight and ruggedized communications device. During simulated exercises at the Fort Dix facility, the wrist-mounted devices were shown depicting a number of different sources of information, including a real-time unmanned air vehicle (UAV) video feed and various other images received through computers running different

applications. These devices have the potential to provide soldiers with advantages in the field that could mitigate risk and improve operational performance. The eight units each contain a 4.3-inch 320x240 full-color, full-motion AMOLED display using a-Si TFT backplanes designed and fabricated on thin metallic foil by LG Display. The front planes were then built on top by UDC using its high-efficiency, full-color PHOLED technology and materials. The use of Universal Display’s PHOLED technology enables these displays to consume less power than comparable AMLCDs, an extremely important feature to lighten the load of electrical power requirements. Designed and integrated by L-3 Display Systems, the units offer various advanced communications features, all integrated into a thin and rugged housing that comfortably fits around a wrist. http://www.universaldisplay.com

A wrist-mounted flexible OLED display and communications device built on thin metal foil, which uses Universal Display's highly efficient phosphorescent OLED

technology and materials

Ascent Solar signs distribution agreement with DisaSolar of France Ascent Solar Technologies, a developer of flexible thin-film solar modules, announced that it has signed a distribution agreement with DisaSolar, a newly established subsidiary company of Megamark/DisaTech Group, a leader in providing complete solutions in architectural, industrial and corporate signage in France and other European countries. DisaSolar will begin distribution of Ascent Solar’s lightweight, flexible, high-power thin-film CIGS modules for off-grid applications integrating flexible solar panels into passenger train roofs and commercial signage structures. The agreement with DisaSolar gives Ascent Solar access to additional emerging market segments in Europe. Recently, the two companies successfully demonstrated PV module integration into train rooftops in partnership with French regional rail company SNCF. The unique characteristics of Ascent Solar’s flexible, lightweight CIGS modules compliment DisaSolar’s heritage in system integration for transportation and corporate signage applications enabling novel applications in emerging segments. http://www.ascentsolar.com http://www.disasolar.fr

Ascent Solar modules applied to an SNCF train roof

NEC develops “organic radical battery” for practical use NEC Corporation announced the development of a thin and flexible organic radical battery (ORB) that is significantly more reliable and produces 1.4 times more output than existing units. These prototype ORBs maintain nearly full capacity, even after repeated charge-discharge, due to anodes that feature the same carbon material as lithium-ion batteries. The new ORB also produce 1.4 times more output than existing units due to the development of new highly conductive cathodes. Furthermore, these ORB are the size of a coin, 0.7mm thin, and boast a capacity of 5mAh. The prototype ORB enables more than ten consecutive flash firings approximately twenty thousand times, and facilitates continuous high luminance LED flash emission. Moreover, the ORB is suitable for next-generation ubiquitous terminals that require flexibility and high output, including IC cards, wearable terminals, and flexible electronic paper. http://www.nec.com


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Roth & Rau MicroSystems joins Holst Centre to research on barriers for flexible electronics Plasma technology provider Roth & Rau MicroSystems, and Holst Centre, an open-innovation initiative by IMEC of Belgium and TNO of The Netherlands, announced their partnership on the development of barriers for flexible electronics such as OLED and OPV. In addition to the expertise of other Holst Centre partners, Roth & Rau MicroSystems will specifically look at roll-to-roll deposition tools for barrier layers. By strengthening the eco-system around its shared research roadmaps, Holst Centre aims to maintain a leading position in the R&D on flexible OLED lighting and signage. For flexible electronics to make the transition from lab to market, finding a good moisture barrier and encapsulation technology is key. Taken into account the low-cost production aspect, candidate technologies must be compatible with roll-to-roll manufacturing processes. Holst Centre’s business model allows academic and industrial players from across the value chain to jointly explore the common challenges and road to market. The partnership between Holst Centre and Roth & Rau Microsystems encompasses the joint development and installation of a roll-to-roll PECVD deposition tool. This will be installed alongside the existing roll-to-roll facilities of Holst Centre. The tool will assist in investigating technologies that target applications such as flexible OLED lighting and organic solar cells. http://www.roth-rau.de http://www.holstcentre.com

TDK shows flexible and transparent PMOLED panels TDK Corp introduced two types of PMOLED panels. The first prototype is flexible and bendable, the other is a transparent display. The flexible OLED panel can be as thin as 0.3mm or less. The weight of the color display and monochrome display models are 1.11g and 0.96g, respectively. TDK uses a resin substrate, which can reduce the thickness and weighs about 1/6 from existing panels using a glass substrate. The flexible panel measures 3.5 inches and a pixel count of 256x64. TDK wants to start volume production at the end of 2011. http://www.tdk.com

Flexible display has a screen size of 3.5 inches at 256x64; A panel of 50% transmittance is new world record. The Samsung Mobile Display transparent panel was about 40%. The see-through panel has a screen size of 2 inches and a

pixel count of 320x240. TDK says that this transparent panel has a top-emission structure.

QD Vision and Solvay to develop a printable electroluminescent platform for Quantum Dot LEDs QD Vision and Solvay announced an agreement under which the companies will develop a printable electroluminescent platform for quantum dot LEDs (QLEDs) that will lead to a new generation of solid state lighting products. Developed by QD Vision, QLEDs are a reliable, energy efficient, tunable color solution for display and lighting applications that reduce manufacturing costs, while employing ultra-thin, transparent or flexible materials. QLEDs utilize printing technologies to enable the manufacture of electroluminescent lighting devices in a wide variety of form factors including thin, lightweight, and flexible substrates. These new solid state lighting devices can be produced efficiently in high volume and at low cost. Quantum dots provide the stability and reliability of inorganic semiconductor materials, and can be processed in solution. This unique capability enables the efficient manufacture of next generation electroluminescent solid state light sources with extraordinary color quality, efficiency, and stability. http://www.qdvision.com http://www.solvay.com


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National Tsing Hua University develops direct-growth fabrication for paper-based electronics Researchers in Taiwan have shown, for the first time, that they can directly grow vertically aligned, highly crystalline and defect-free single-crystalline zinc oxide nanorods and nano-needles on paper. Reporting their findings in Advanced Materials, researchers from the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at National Tsing Hua University have fabricated prototype hybrid junction diodes and UV photo-detectors based on ZnO nano-rod arrays on paper. Initially, the team synthesized aligned ZnO nanowires on a piece of paper that predominantly contains cellulose and calcium carbonate. In order to demonstrate the potential for organic/inorganic hybrid junction devices on paper substrates, the team fabricated p-n junction diodes with an average active junction of 1x1cm using zinc oxide nanowires with 90nm diameter and 1.5µm length, grown on a 50nm gold-coated paper substrate. The researchers point out that stable electrical performance of hybrid devices at different bending or twisting positions is a critical challenge for flexible substrates. For this reason, they measured the electrical/mechanical fatigue properties of the diode at different bending positions across the junction area. They found that there is only negligible difference in the turn-on voltage of the devices while the forward current at high voltage is slightly decreased with increase of bending angle. Repetitive bending of the diode affected the performance only marginally. http://www.nthu.edu.tw

a) Representative FESEM image of aligned ZnO nanorods. b) TEM image of a single nanorod. c) HRTEM image taken from the edge of the ZnO nanorod. Inset: corresponding SAED pattern.

New equation from University of Michigan could advance research in solar cells and OLEDs An equation developed in part by researchers at the University of Michigan could do for organic semiconductors what the Shockley ideal diode equation did for inorganic semiconductors: help to enable their wider adoption. Without the Shockley equation, the computers of today would not be possible. Developed in 1949 by William Shockley, the inventor of the transistor, the Shockley equation describes the relationship between electric current and voltage in inorganic semiconductors such as silicon. The new equation describes the relationship of current to voltage at the junctions of organic semiconductors – carbon-rich compounds that don’t necessarily come from a biological source, but resemble them. Organic semiconductors present special challenges for researchers because they are more disordered than their inorganic counterparts. But they could enable advanced solar cells, thin and intense OLED displays, and high-efficiency lighting. About six years ago, researchers at University of Michigan realized that they could use Shockley's equation to describe the current/voltage relationship in their organic solar cells to a degree. Their findings were published, and from that time on, many physicists and engineers used the Shockley equation for organic semiconductors even though it didn’t describe the physics perfectly. The new equation does. It will allow researchers to better describe and predict the properties of the different organic semiconductors they are working with. And in that way, they will be able to more efficiently choose which material best suits the needs of the device they are working on. http://www.umich.edu


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Electronics Conference & Exhibition October 19-21, 2010, Dresden, Germany

In the first of four reports, Phillip Hill covers presentations from InnoPhysics/Fontys University of Applied Sciences, Fraunhofer-Institute for Photonic Microsystems (IPMS), Technische Universität

Dresden, and Leibniz-Institut für Polymerforschung

μPlasmaPrinting on Plastics Alquin Stevens, InnoPhysics, Eindhoven, The Netherlands Jan Bernards, Fontys University of Applied Sciences, Eindhoven, The Netherlands

“μPlasmaPrint” on demand combines the benefits of digital on-demand with versatility plasma: selective, local, on demand, mask-less. The technology uses a multi nozzle print head, multiple DBDs (dielectric barrier discharges), 4-10kV peak-to-peak voltage, 10-100 kHz AC, gap between nozzles and substrate 100-300mm, and controlled gas flow enabling specific functionalities. Line widths are currently 200 microns to 1mm. The partners are currently working towards 80 microns and below. μPlasmaPrint has a large effect on the wettability of substrates. The effect can be used to improve inkjet printing results. Resolution will be improved further together with line width, line

pitch, and edge effects. Plasma and settings will be optimized. The effect on inkjet printed structures will be investigated, and fluid dynamics on surfaces will be mastered towards surface energy controlled printing of uniform, patterned functional materials.

μPlasmaPrint on demand on foils/glass

Effect of Light Intensity on the Degradation Behavior of Small Molecule Organic Solar Cells Martin Hermenau, Sebastian Scholz, Karl Leo, and Moritz Riede Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Germany

On a series of degradation measurements on small molecule organic solar cells, the researchers show that the number of extracted charge carriers is a suitable measure to compare lifetime measurements on organic solar cells at different intensities. On the one hand, they present that the number of extracted charge carriers is important to determine the degree of degradation. On the other hand, the results indicate that the energy of irradiated photons is significant for accelerated measurements. The solar cells in this work show a clear tendency to accelerated ageing with increased intensity of white light. The presented method, taking the number of extracted charge carriers as a measure for degradation, works for samples with similar illumination colors. If the irradiated spectrum is different, another ageing is observed, which is expressed by a different slope of efficiency vs. extracted charges. Based on these results, it should be possible to operate and interpret accelerated ageing experiments for organic solar cells to


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determine their lifetimes quickly. With the number of extracted charges as a measure for the degradation, one is able to compare measurements at different intensities and to focus on a deeper understanding of the underlying degradation processes to enhance the lifetime of those devices, e.g. by exchanging the affected materials or improving the layer composition.

OLED lighting Tile Preparation on Gen2 Deposition Tool M. Toerker, M. Jahnel, L. Ruppel, Ch. May, and K. Leo Fraunhofer-Institute for Photonic Microsystems (IPMS), Dresden, Germany

The presentation described a Gen2 pilot fabrication line for OLED lighting and OPV. It uses a modular and fully automated cluster system with a tact time down to three minutes. Suppliers are Sunic System (Korea) and Aixtron (Germany). The rigid substrate size is 370x470mm (Gen2) using plasma pretreatment and organic film deposition (organic vapor phase deposit OVPD, and vacuum thermal evaporation VTE), metal film deposition (e.g. Al, Ag), and direct connection to the glass encapsulation system. Bright and efficient lighting tiles were prepared on a Gen2 substrate. They consist of 50x100mm modules producing 22.5lm/W with laminated outcoupling foil for bottom emission: 3 bin-classes with respect to color coordinates for bottom emission; 1 bin-class with respect to color coordinates for semi-transparent OLEDs. It is a stable process (run-to-run, day-to-day) for complex tandem OLED stack bottom emission and transparent devices.

Gen2 pilot fabrication line for OLED lighting and OPV; Lighting modules produced in conjunction with LEDON OLED Lighting GmbH

Surface-initiated Polycondensation Anton Kiriy, Leibniz-Institut für Polymerforschung, Dresden, Germany

The motivation of this research is that the chemistry of conjugated polymers is not efficient enough. The achievements so far are that a number of polymerization methods to get homopolymers, random and alternate copolymers have been developed (Stille, Suzuki, Yamamoto, Heck, Sonogashira, etc.). They allow a fine tuning of intrinsic opto-electronic properties (HOMO-LUMO levels), but there are drawbacks: relatively low reproducibility (batch-to-batch variation); and relatively ill-defined materials (on-chain defects, poor end-groups control, uncontrolled MW and broad MW distribution). Tuning of microstructure and architecture is hardly possible. Therefore, fine engineering of nanomorphology and interfaces is not possible. Performances of devices (OFETs, OPVs, OLEDs) depend crucially on nanoscale organization and molecular packing, not only upon chemical composition and “intrinsic” characteristics. Current strategies for arrangement of active components (e.g., donor and acceptor) mostly rely upon self-assembly which may work, but also may not, that is difficult to control: tedious optimizations of the processing conditions are required. The challenge is to “encode” into the polymer structure the ability of materials (or blends) to assemble into desirable nanomorphologies: to help (or “force”) self-assembly properties. The idea is a “preorganization” approach (covalent, chemical assembly), to arrange many components (e.g., polymer chains) on a strictly defined way – however it needs completely new chemical tools.


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The researchers chose the ligand exchange route toward efficient initiators for quasi-living polycondensation of thiophenes: surface-initiated polymerization from organosilica nano particles was developed. The resulting hairy

particles exhibit unusual optical properties demonstrating chain-overcrowding. Photovoltaic properties of the hairy nanoparticles were preliminarily studied. These results open new perspectives in designing of new architectures of conductive polymers for solar cells.

“Hairy” particles exhibit unusual optical properties

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OLEDs World Summit September 27-29, 2010, San Francisco, California

In the first of three reports, Phillip Hill covers presentations from Bardsley Consulting, Cambridge Display Technology, US Department of Energy, Flexible Display Center at Arizona State

University, DisplaySearch, and Cambrios

Challenges for OLED Manufacturers in the Lighting Market J. Norman Bardsley, Bardsley Consulting, Danville, California

Bardsley gave a list of required characteristics of emitted light from diffuse sources. Brightness should be a luminous emittance of 10,000 lm/m2, equivalent to 3,000cd/m2 with Lambertian emission. Color rendering should be CRI>85, but a new color quality standard from NIST would be a more useful measure. Color coordinates should be CCT<4000K, and should be below the black body curve on the CIE chart. Customer control of color could be a differentiator. Voltage drop across the panel should be less than 0.1V. What does this mean for layer thickness uniformity? Angular distribution is not Lambertian. Luminaire manufacturers want the freedom to tailor the angular distribution. In terms of performance issues, for brightness costs scale more closely with area rather than lumen output so one should increase luminous emittance from 3000lm/m2 to 10,000 lm/m2. Lifetime would decrease by a factor of 5, unless we increase the efficacy by 3, preferably by improving out-coupling from 20% to 60%. Efficacy: we should increase LER (luminous efficacy of radiation) from 325lm/W to 350lm/W by reducing IR emissions, and reduce drive voltage for 2mA/cm2 to 2.8V. We should increase IQE to 90%, reduce IR losses to below 5%, and increase light extraction to ~75%. This would give a panel efficacy of 350x0.8x0.9x0.95x0.75 = 180lm/W. Uniformity should be <20% variation across the panel, and voltage drop must be less than 0.1V.

Manufacturing strategies are sheet processing vs. roll-to-roll; rigid substrate vs. flexible; vacuum processing vs. solution processing. Bardsley Consulting has analyzed two extremes: vacuum processing on sheets of glass (UDC/Moser Baer project); and solution processing on rolls of plastic (GE/DuPont). Many other combinations are possible. With luminescent materials, to reach long-term targets for efficiency, we will need all phosphorescent emitters. We still need a true blue phosphorescent emitter with long lifetime. The most popular phosphorescent emitters contain iridium. Iridium is one of the least abundant natural elements; only rhenium, ruthenium and rhodium are rarer. Fortunately, we need very little: if we assume a typical emitter thickness of 3x10nm, density of hosts of 1700kg/m3, mass of emitter layers of 0.05g/m2, mass of phophorescents @6% doping of 0.003g/m2, iridium content of 0.0008g/m2, and cost of iridium at $15/g, the value of Ir in the emissive layer is $0.01/m2. Assuming the cost of phosphorescent materials is $1000/g, the cost of dopants is then $6/m2 at 50% utilization.

Bardsley analyzed the availability of critical materials. Will we run out of iridium or indium? Will increased demand for these materials lead to a huge run-up in costs? In 2018 the global lamp inventory will produce around 200x109 kilolumens. Assume that OLED lamp production in 2018 will be 2x109 kilolumens (1% of inventory). This will require ~2x108m2 of OLED panels per year (@10,000 lumens/m2). The total manufacturing cost would be about $20B per year (@$10 per kilolumen). Assume all emissive materials contain iridium, and all anodes contain ITO. Assume 50% materials usage, 100nm ITO thickness and 30nm of emissive material. The Ir content is ~6x10-

4g/m2 with a current value of $0.01/m2. The total demand for Ir would be 240kg per year, which is ~10% of current


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production. If the In content is ~0.56g/m2 with a current value of $0.17/m2, the total demand for In would be 220 tons per year, which is ~40% of current production. The conclusion is that indium alternatives may be needed, but the problem may not be urgent. There are issues with out-coupling enhancement. Releasing light trapped in the substrate is the easiest. This fraction could be enhanced by matching the refractive indices (with high-index substrate at ~1.7 or low index organics at ~1.5). Structures between the substrate and electrode are probably the most effective. Electrodes with low index could be very helpful, but structures between the electrodes will interfere with the OLED operation. No one solution seems good enough, but effects of multiple structures may not be additive. Many solutions change the color and angular distribution of emitted light. Lab claims may be inconsistent with high volume production: e.g. external films from 3M give 1.5x enhancement. Creating patterned layers can be expensive: prism sheets for LCDs cost ~$20/m2.

Bardsley has composed an impact matrix of materials and requirements

Polymer OLED Technology – Materials Development for Display & Lighting Applications Ilesh Bidd, Cambridge Display Technology, Cambridge, England

Bidd discussed polymer OLED chemistry. Molecular weight control and high molecular weights are achievable. Polymerization is generally robust with respect to reaction conditions. The process is suitable for various molecular architectures: random, alternating, block. High purity has been achieved to meet the needs of the semiconductor industry, and is scalable to >20 liter reactors. P-OLED degradation understanding has been obtained: stable charge-carrier injection was investigated and achieved; the governing process of degradation was found to be photo luminescence (PL) decay; exciton itself is a main origin of PL decay. From these observations, CDT has designed molecular structures to slow-down PL decay with controlled TTA (triplet/triplet annihilation). CDT has achieved longer lifetime for flue, maintaining simple device structures. LEP can be patterned by IJP. This process has now been developed to an extent that efficiencies and conductivities are similar to what is measured in spin coated devices that are used for general material evaluation and development. Bidd concluded by saying that printable OLED is the future and acknowledged by most major players to be so – vacuum processed small molecules is a transitional technology, and color filter-on-white will not fly on efficiency considerations. The choice is solution processed small molecule OLED, or solution processed polymer OLED. For P-OLED , there is a lot of covert activity behind the scenes by major players as materials performance improves rapidly. OLED displays will drive materials development and expand the OLED supply chain for the benefit of both display and lighting players. With the P-OLED lead in solution processing, the winds are shifting in its direction.


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OLEDs: Lab to Market, Soon? James R. Brodrick, US Department of Energy, Washington, District of Columbia

The first OLED lighting product was released by Ingo Maurer in 2008. Currently there is limited OLED penetration into the lighting market. Penetration is expected to increase as prices drop. OLEDs are currently used for display applications. General illumination applications are not commercially viable. A handful of niche products exist with high price, limited quantities, and significant performance limitations. Long-term opportunities are applications in general area lighting in public and commercial spaces, and high-end decorative lighting taking advantage of the distributed, uniform, high-quality light offered by OLED technology. Other factors are new form factors (integrated with walls, ceilings, windows), and flexible and transparent.

Brodick detailed some projects DOE is involved with. A joint project with Universal Display, Armstrong, and the universities of Michigan and Southern California has demonstrated the first US phosphorescent OLED luminaire system. It includes decorative housing, power supply, mounting, and maintenance provisions. It has 51lm/W – twice as efficient as halogen-based systems – and snaps into the Armstrong TechZone ceiling system (see photo).

The University of Florida has improved extraction efficiency in a joint project with Lehigh University to enhance light extraction efficiency in OLED devices. Preliminary results indicate luminance increase of 60% compared to other techniques. Other techniques can be costly or incompatible with large devices. The new technique can be scaled to industrial processes.

GE and DuPont have collaborated on printable OLED lighting. A new project seeks to integrate GE’s pre-pilot roll-to-roll manufacturing infrastructure with high performance phosphorescent materials; advanced device architectures; plastic ultra-high barrier films; and an advanced encapsulation scheme. The goal is to eliminate differences in OLED performance between laboratory scale batch process and pre-pilot production.

Finally, Universal Display Corporation and Moser Baer Technologies have collaborated to design and set up two pilot phosphorescent OLED manufacturing lines. The facility will provide prototype lighting panels to US luminaire manufacturers to incorporate into products.

Challenges facing OLEDs for general illumination

Cambrios ClearOhm Material as the Transparent Conductors for OLEDs Rahul Gupta, Cambrios, Sunnyvale, California

ClearOhm material can be used as an anode for OLED displays and lighting. ClearOhm can also be used at the transparent cathode for top emitting OLEDs. ClearOhm is under evaluation at multiple OLED lighting and display manufacturers. ClearOhm material can be used as an effective transparent electrode in OLED devices. The company has demonstrated improvements in efficiency compared to ITO devices, and improved light outcoupling as a result of index matching. There is opportunity to improve performance further such as by increasing light outcoupling by adding haze promoters. Scalable processes are available to coat on large substrates using sheet or roll-to-roll coating. There are also a variety of patterning methods available, including printing direct patterning.


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Flexible TFT Backplanes for AMOLEDs Nick Colaneri, Flexible Display Center at Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona

The center’s mission is to speed the development and commercialization of flexible display and electronics technology. Flex manufacturing challenges are the handling of flexible substrates; increased defectivity; temperature constraints due to the substrate; and existing tool infrastructure meant for rigid substrates, i.e. silicon, glass. The initial focus has been on low temperature a-Si TFTs: new gate dielectric; new channel; new contacts; new stack etch; new SD etch; new contact gate etch; improved ILD; better solvent resistance, wider process window; intermediate process modifications (e.g. reduced damage from ash process); etch process adaptations; substrate handling protocols; distortion management; and substrate quality. To enable commercial success towards manufacturing, ASU has developed a high quality high performance plastic substrate with DTF planarized PEN; a low temperature planarizing thin film material with Honeywell PTS Materials Series; a large area mist coater: EVG 150XL (GEN 3.5); and state-of-the-art low temperature 180°C a-Si:H TFT on flex technology. Scaling to Gen II manufacturing demonstration is underway.

OLED Display and OLED Lighting Technology and Market Forecast Jennifer Colegrove, DisplaySearch, Santa Clara, California

In her summary and business strategies recommendation, Colegrove said that OLED display revenues will exceed $8 billion in 2017, up from $0.8B in 2009. AMOLED revenues passed PMOLED in Q1'09. AMOLED shipment will pass PM in 2011. Oxide TFT, and a-Si TFT backplane breakthrough, together with color patterning are needed for AMOLED to move to large sizes. AMOLED fab capacity is currently at the limit to meet demand. Over 10 new AMOLED fabs are expected in the next two years. PMOLED revenues peaked in 2005 falling since 2006. The industry should seriously consider OLED lighting. OLED displays need a niche application where it is difficult for LCD to compete: flexible displays, transparent displays, and lighting. OLED lighting will pick up in 2011, and reach $6.3 billion by 2018, she said. We must diversify OLED lighting for different applications. Both higher efficiency, long lifetime and high prices type and lower efficiency, shorter lifetime and lower prices type are needed. OLED lighting costs need to be reduced, and efficiency improved for mass adoption. OLED can be combined with other hot technologies like touch screens, e-paper displays, and 3D.

Samsung Mobile Display’s Gen 5.5 AMOLED fab investment is confirmed. Gen 8 is in the horizon. Over 10 new AMOLED fabs will be installed or updated in the next two years.


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IMI Ink Jet Technological Showcase

September 8-9, 2010, Baltimore, Maryland

In the second of two reports, Phillip Hill covers presentations from Printed Electronics Now, and

Sun Chemical

The Growing Market for Printed Electronics David Savastano, Printed Electronics Now, Ramsay, New Jersey

Printed electronics is the merger between the worlds of printing and electronics. It was a $1.6 billion market in 2009, but it is thought to be potentially a $330 billion market by 2027, according to IDTechEx. Printing is starting to replace traditional electronics manufacturing content and open the door to a significant amount of new product development such as OLED displays. The key markets for PE are photovoltaics, RFID, printed batteries and sensors, displays and e-paper, consumer packaging, lighting, and military applications – and inkjet has a role to play. There are more than 3,000 companies and universities around the world working in the field of PE and RFID. These range from major international companies like BASF, Motorola, Texas Instruments, and DuPont to start-ups like Konarka, Blue Spark Technologies, NTERA, Kovio, Plastic Logic, and Plextronics. Venture capital funding remains strong as investors look for the winning technology – more than $2 billion since the start of 2008 – and in a $330 billion market, that can be quite a payoff.

Not everyone is going to be a winner. Well-funded companies like Nanoident/Bioident, Elumin8, Leadis, Polymer Vision, and printed systems GmbH have fallen by the wayside, and others are in Chapter 11. Many others have yet to make a profit. Which technologies will become the industry leaders?

The photovoltaics market is dominated by rigid solar structures, but thin film flexible applications are making gains. The critical advantages that PE offers in the PV space is the ability to mass produce flexible solar cells at low cost for new applications. The key drawback is efficiency and lifespan (BIPV). The key technologies in thin film solar are aSi and CIGS. Amorphous silicon (non-crystalline) uses far less silicon on flexible substrates. Companies involved include REC Group, Energy Conversion Devices, and Xunlight. CIGS (copper indium gallium (di)selenide) has reached 19.9% efficiency. The market is expected to grow from $403 million in 2011 to $2,6 billion in 2016, according to NanoMarkets. Companies involved include Ascent Solar, Bosch Solar, Honda, HelioVolt, and Nanosolar. Other technologies are CdTe, DSSC, and organic PV. First Solar is the largest solar cell manufacturer (CdTe) with more than 2.2GW. It broke the $1/W barrier ($0.76) and had $2.1 billion in sales in 2009.

There has been tremendous growth in the market for e-readers with Amazon Kindle, Sony eReader, and Nook among the leaders. The market for display components is expected to be $131 million in 2010, and $1.17 billion by 2014, according to IDTechEx. Cell phones, smart cards, posters, displays, and clothing are other key markets. Major companies have a big stake in e-paper. Prime View acquired E Ink; AUO Optronics bought 30% of SiPix; and Philips spun out Liquavista. But there are also challenges. Polymer Vision (also from Philips) went bankrupt, and Plastic Logic scratched its Que e-reader.

There are opportunities for PE in lighting for EL, LED, and OLED with companies like Osram, GE, Philips, and Universal Display for LED and OLED. Key players in EL are Rogers Corporation, Electroluminate, ELAM EL Industries Ltd. Allied PhotoChemical, and Elumin8.


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RFID was one of the early success stories. Its market size was $5.56 billion in 2009, and will reach $25 billion by 2019 according to IDTechEx. The problem with a 1 cent RFID tag is that it can’t really be done – the price of silicon and processing the tags does not allow it. But printing the tag using organic materials can reduce the price to that level. Kovio and PolyIC are working on it. The major players for tags and inlays are Alien Technology, Avery Dennison, Confidex, Texas Instruments, and UPM Raflatac. For readers the companies are Alien, Impinj, Motorola, ODIN Technologies, and ThingMagic. Companies large and small alike are active in this field.

Key inkjet companies in PE are Printed Electronics Ltd., and Conductive Inkjet Technology on the manufacturing side; NovaCentrix, ImTech, and Sun Chemical for conductive inks; and Creadrop, Dimatix, Roth & Rau AG (OTB Solar), Xennia, and Trident on the hardware side.

Ink Jet Solutions for the Digital World Peter Walshe, SunChemical, Bath, England

SunChemical is the world’s largest manufacturer of high quality printing inks and organic pigments with over 11,000 employees. It has over 300 manufacturing, sales, research, and technical service facilities. SunJet is the focused global ink jet division of SunChemical. The division is committed to the development, manufacture, and supply of ink jet products. It focuses on OEM as its primary channel to market and strongly markets its products towards established and emerging applications for ink jet technology within the world of print.

Technology advances have allowed ink jet to advance progressively into new markets through significant achievements in ink, head, and curing technology. Existing, older technology is finding new outlets as markets evolve. The key areas in inkjet manufacturing are electronics, PCB legend printing, etch resist, conductive and dielectric applications, and photovoltaics. Ink jet is used both to print etch resist and conductives in PV. Presently solar energy creates only 0.01% of global energy demand.

Inkjet has made major accomplishments. Coding and marking in the office are whole new businesses. Wide format graphics based on piezo technology has been a great success. There is ongoing progress in traditional print areas: labels, commercial print, packaging, publishing, and transpromo. Ink jet is a manufacturing tool for electronics, edible, PV and more in the future, Walshe concluded.

Ink jet is used both to print etch resist and conductives in PV


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Organic and Large Area Electronics Meeting June 14-15, 2010, Brussels, Belgium

In the first of four reports, Phillip Hill covers this EU Organic and Large Area Electronics (OLAE) cluster meeting with presentations from INFSO, Siemens AG, Thales Avionics LCD, Fraunhofer Institute for

Photonic Microsystems (IPMS), IMEC (x2), VTT, Energy Research Centre of The Netherlands (ECN), and VDI/VDE Innovation+Technik GmbH

The event brought together 34 projects, financially supported through the European Commission’s 7th Framework Program, dealing with a broad spectrum of advanced research on organic electronics and applications. The two-day meeting agenda grouped several main research and support areas for discourse: lighting & displays; organic photovoltaic; organic electronics, materials & sensors; manufacturing technologies, integration & devices; as well as the OLAE research activities coordinating and supporting Quadriga projects. The 2010 cluster/concertation meeting’s objectives were:

Consolidating the OLAE community in Europe, and avoiding unnecessary duplication of efforts Addressing common issues and roadblocks/“red brick walls” Moving on innovation: “value chain”, technology transfer Moving to standards Discussing joint research initiatives and research topics Identifying topics for a future ERANET+ action on OLAE

http://cordis.europa.eu/fp7/ict/photonics/concertation140610_en.html

Highly Flexible Printed ITO-free OPV Modules Jan Kroon, Energy Research Centre of The Netherlands (ECN), Petten, The Netherlands

The recently started project HIFLEX (Highly Flexible Printed ITO-free OPV Modules) is focusing its research on OPVs for mobile and remote ICT applications. HIFLEX aims at ITO-free solar cell architecture achieving at least 90% cell efficiency of a “standard” ITO-based solar cell. Furthermore, the team is confident to enhance the power conversion efficiency up to a maximum of 10% by the end of the project compared with the current ITO reference of about 7%. The project uses only commercially available material. In the debate afterwards it was mentioned that Members of the European Parliament are preparing a proposal to ban nano-silver and nanotubes; this would have severe consequences for the research and industry in the area of OLAE and could endanger the European competitiveness in this area. This issue needs further follow-up, it is stressed.

Networks of Excellence FlexNet and PolyNet Lars Heinze, VDI/VDE Innovation+Technik GmbH, Berlin, Germany

POLYNET announced the publication of the first version of its OLAE Handbook, which will be shortly uploaded on the PolyMap data base. Further highlights in 2009 were the released white paper on critical research issues and the successful set up of a new project, POLARIC, as a follow up of research collaboration on nano-imprint lithography. POLYNET has a strong focus on western and northern countries and is following an approach of research collaborations for vertical structuring of competencies. POLYNET will finish soon but the new project FLEXNET will take over at the end of 2010. FLEXNET is focusing on materials and device integration and will be offering technology transfer services to companies, especially SMEs and start-ups in the OLAE field. The new group extends its orientation also to the south and eastern Europe.


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Organic Electronics – The European Perspective Thierry Van der Pyl, INFSO, Brussels, Belgium

Thierry Van der Pyl, INFSO Director Components and Systems, outlined in his opening address the priorities of the European Commission for this area. The communication on key enabling technologies and the digital agenda for Europe, one of the flagship initiatives of the Commission’s EU2020 strategy for innovation, sustainability and growth, identify photonics as a key enabling technology and present several initiatives that are relevant for the field. Photonics, and with it organic and large area electronics, are of strategic importance for Europe which is reflected in the latest work-program: the forthcoming call foresees €50 million funding for OLAE technologies and applications and the call for manufacturing solutions foresees an additional €20 million. The next FP7 call (call 7) is scheduled for September 2010 until mid January 2011 and the call for manufacturing solutions for July-December 2011. Thierry Van der Pyl also mentioned the set-up of a high level group formed by about 25 high-level personalities (CEOs, professors, etc), supported by technical groups, in order to make concrete recommendations for policy actions in key enabling technologies.

Some of the EU’s work programs in the field of photonics and organics electronics

Cost-Efficient Lighting Devices based on Liquid Processes and Ionic Organo-metallic Complexes Wiebke Sarfert, Siemens AG, Munich, Germany

The CELLO consortium (short for cost-efficient lighting devices based on liquid processes and ionic organo-metallic complexes) consists of the University of Valencia, Spain; Siemens AG, Germany; University of Basel, Switzerland; Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche (CNR), Italy; Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Switzerland; OSRAM GmbH, Germany; and Valtion Teknillinen Tutkimuskeskus (VTT), Finland.

The CELLO objectives are to develop thin film flexible and large area lighting sources based on light-emitting electrochemical cells (LECs), and develop scalable and roll-to-roll compatible wet processes to deposit the molecular active component and the metal contact. Its goals are power efficient (>25lm/W); stable (>5,000 hours); low cost (much less than OLEDs); and large area white lighting sources.


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AMAzOLED José Margarino, Thales Avionics LCD, Neuilly-sur-Seine, France

The AMAzOLED project targets are free shape OLEDs for demanding applications in avionics and automotive applications. Demonstrator targets specifications are QVGA, 1000cd/m², and operating temperature -40°C to 85°C. AMAzOLED solutions are free shape and conformal using polymorphous and/or microcrystalline silicon for improved VT shift and compatible with industrial amorphous silicon processes. The TFT design will include row driver integration using a low temperature process from FlexiDis compatible with flexible substrates. The basic process of encapsulation has been studied. Multi-layered thin-film encapsulation has been evaluated and it is shown that it provides a strong improvement of efficiency. Combination of TFE plus glass capping with full-sheet gluing, simulating actual full display encapsulation, shows very good performance under aggressive humid ageing. A full coupling process has been developed, using a spacer technology that combines good glue confinement and accurate cell gap control.

An OLED development for an auto application

HYPOLED: VGA OLED Micro-display for HMD and Micro-projection Uwe Vogel, Fraunhofer Institute for Photonic Microsystems (IPMS), Dresden, Germany

HYPOLED stands for “High-Performance OLED-Microdisplays for Mobile Multimedia HMD and Projection Applications”. Its major targets are VGA, >10knits, P-OLED and SM-OLED, 24 bit color, <12μm, wireless video I/F (DVB-T/H/WLAN). The project duration was January 2008 to June 2010. On OLED integration, the IPMS main results were that OLED integration was successfully achieved for white OLEDs with color filters and for

monochrome green OLEDs. IPMS successfully integrated all necessary production steps to pilot manufacture of RGB microdisplays.

Left: 8-inch wafer with OLED and color filter. Middle: single microdisplay die. Right:

microdisplay showing test image.

Flexible Organic Active Matrix OLED displays for Nomadic Applications Paul Heremans, IMEC, Ghent, Belgium

The FLAME project, started in 2008, stands for flexible organic active matrix OLED. Its goal is rollable high-information OLED displays for nomadic applications: materials, processing technology (including encapsulation) and substrate handling procedures to make organic light-emitting color displays (OLED) on very thin plastic foils

and driven by organic thin-film driving transistors – foil, flexible, rollable. Its objectives are to develop a low-temperature, high-quality, solution-processed organic TFT technology on flexible plastic substrates; develop a top light-emitting, high efficiency OLED device structure that can be used with OTFTs; develop a rollable, faultless thin-film encapsulation layer; and integrate the above elements into a rollable color display.

The material choices and design


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Flexible Autonomous Cost Efficient Energy Source and Storage (FACESS) Jukka Hast, VTT, Helsinki, Finland

Flexibility, mobility and cost efficiency are predominant themes in organic photovoltaics. The project FACESS (Flexible Autonomous Cost Efficient Energy Source and Storage) is focusing its research on roll-to-roll printing mass production technologies for low cost organic photovoltaic devices and thin film batteries (TFB). The FACESS

project aims at the development of an autonomous energy source and storage concept by integrating OPV and TFB modules including the related control circuitry on a flexible foil substrate. Other aims are to develop control transistor circuitry on foil to control operation voltage and charge of TFBs, and integrate OPV and TFB modules and control transistor circuitry to a flexible autonomous energy source and storage device. There has been no material development – only commercial materials are used.

Development of an inert gas printing machine installed in June 2010

Plasmon Resonance for Improved Optical Absorption in Solar Cells (PRIMA) Barry P. Rand, IMEC, Ghent, Belgium

The concept of the project is improving the light absorption in solar cells by plasmonic effects, enabling to thin down solar cells without sacrificing efficiency, leading to lower material utilization and a cost benefit. The approach is to understand the fundamentals: study model systems (IMEC, Australian National University, Chalmers, Imperial College London); perform advanced modeling (Imperial, Chalmers, IMEC); and investigate multiple solar cell technologies: Si (IMEC, ANU, Photovoltech), organic solar cells (IMEC), dye sensitized (Chalmers), and III-V quantum wells (Imperial, QuantaSol).

The state-of-the-art is that there has been plenty of very recent work covering plasmonic enhancement of many different solar cell technologies. However the results are often very dependent on the system under investigation. Usually non-optimized reference solar cells are employed for comparison. Particularly for Si cells, structures on the front surface result in interference issues between scattered/transmitted light, thus the project aims to put structures on the back side. In the future, work will discriminate the mechanisms responsible for the enhancement and apply the optimized appropriate mechanism to thin film solar cell technologies and conventional Si solar cells. It will

involve cell-scale fabrication of plasmonic nanostructures, compatible with solar cell processing, and integration of the plasmonic nanostructures into different types of solar cells and bench-marking the measured efficiency enhancement. The end aim is for an overall cost reduction in €/W.

A plasmon is a collective oscillation of free electrons, in this case a dipolar resonance


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Large-area, Organic and Printed Electronics Convention May 31-June 2, 2010, Frankfurt, Germany

In this third report, Phillip Hill covers day two of the event with presentations from Merck Chemicals Ltd, Plextronics, Friedrich-Schiller University, FUJIFILM Dimatix, PolyIC, Hewlett-

Packard/Phicot Inc, Applied Materials, University of California, VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, Yonsei University, PChem Associates, and CDT/Sumitomo Chemical

OLEDs – Past, Present and Future David Fyfe, CDT/Sumitomo Chemical, Cambridge, England

Fyfe asked: “What did we learn from the display experience that is applicable to lighting? What does it tell us about the real prospects in lighting and extension into large displays? What are the remaining challenges for the OLED technology to become an outstanding success in lighting and large displays?” The OLED community completely underestimated the determination of the LCD community to defend their turf and to deploy the vast majority of their R&D efforts to maintain LCD dominance, he said. Better technology does not always meet with open arms from the incumbents.

The issues for OLED in displays are materials performance (lifetime, efficiency, color); backplane availability (performance challenges of a-Si are significant, and the TFT community was generally hostile to OLED technology developers denying access to TFTs for development purposes); and cost structure (the LCD industry has dramatically lowered costs since OLED became a threat thus raising the barrier to entry for OLED).

AMOLED started as a monopoly controlled by those with an installed a-Si/LTPS TFT backplane base. Passive matrix OLED was a side-show, despite early successes, as attention focused on lower power consumption, and higher resolution displays. Kodak blazed a lonely trail with Sanyo, but… Because the OLED technology developers did not control a key part of the technology ecosystem, the LCD industry controlled the pace of introduction of the entire technology. Is lighting different? Arguably it is, says Fyfe.

OLEDs in lighting will compete with incumbent technologies (halogens and fluorescents) and SSL entrants such as inorganic LEDs (iLEDs) at potentially higher brightness than required for displays. Solid-state lighting efficiency, longer lifetime, quality of light and environmental benefits make it a “sure thing” for the future of lighting – but will it be iLEDs, OLEDs or both together? iLEDs are currently leading in performance, but are point sources with challenges in thermal management and color matching (binning).

OLEDs have potential to scale to efficiencies and lifetimes greater than the incumbent technologies. OLEDs have some features that advantage them from the other new entrant, iLED, particularly for large area lights with efficient and uniform emission. Printing technology manufacture and simplified device structure are keys to low cost production. iLED aims to compete head-on with the unique features of OLED –shades of LCD, as Fyfe commented. OLED lighting challenges are: need to develop a phosphorescent blue to achieve competitive efficiencies; reduction of manufacturing complexity is essential – this favors POLED technology; need to work on luminance uniformity and efficiency for large panels; need to develop a manufacturing technique for low-cost, large area panels; need to work with the supply chain to avoid roadblocks to commercialization where vested interests compete head-on.


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OLED-based niche lighting is probably feasible in the short term. However, for mainstream, commodity lighting, OLED has a significant way to go – higher efficiency is needed and the cost/manufacturing method issue isn’t resolved.

Efficiency of OLED lighting devices. Only ~33% of light escapes a

simple, planar OLED device, so both internal structure and external device outcoupling techniques offer up to 3x in efficiency improvement. Even with an all-phosphorescent

system, maximum OLED efficiency with outcoupling would top out at

~150lm/W.

Functional Materials for Printable and Flexible Electronics Johannes Canisius, Merck Chemicals Ltd., Southampton, England

Merck is well prepared for OTFT mass production. Key materials have been upscaled to kilogram scale, and a reliable supply chain and quality control is in place. The company has been actively working on improved stability, uniformity and reproducibility. It has optimized BG dielectrics to enable standard electrode sputter conditions (ITO, Ag, Cu, etc). Surface treatment technology is in place to enable industry standard and cheap electrode materials (for example copper). To show a broader range of content, black and white electrophoretic e-readers must evolve into full color devices. Most color prototypes use a black and white EPD plus an overlaid color filter array. Their ultimate performance may not be vivid enough for high-end color e-paper applications. Alternative, color-filter-free approaches are required. High absorptivity, saturated color polymer microparticles are a route to color-filter-free EPDs. Merck is developing a range of materials to enable a very tunable particle system, enabling custom EPD fluid design. EPD polymer particles are formulated into custom EPD fluids. EPD fluids are not designed for a specific EPD display architecture. In-plane switching, vertical switching, single particle system switching, dual particle system switching are all possible with these EPD fluids. Merck has developed innovative front and backplane materials for printable electronics and flexible displays. Their printable organic transistor materials enable mobilities of up to 4cm2/Vs and tolerate standard processing conditions. The new EPD frontplane material concepts address unmet needs in color and freedom of design to enable reflective, color filter free architectures. The new OPV materials are realizing high efficiencies with effective and green manufacturing concepts. The company has established high purity synthesis at large scale, along with an effective supply chain and quality control management.

EPD polymer particles are formulated into custom EPD fluids

Inks for Printed Displays, Lighting and Solar Power Mary Boone, Plextronics, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

Solution processing is key to enabling low-cost OLED production – the hybrid approach is a good starting point. Plextronics’ solution-processable HIL technology is delivering high-performance for low-cost OLED manufacturing. Energy harvesting for promotional displays is a near-term opportunity for OPV. Plexcore PV 2000 delivers the performance and manufacturability required to power EPD displays.


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Synthesis and Inkjet Printing of Functional Materials for Plastic Electronics Ulrich S. Schubert, Friedrich-Schiller University, Jena, Germany

Inkjet printing is an interesting tool for scientific research that enables on demand deposition of functional materials. It can be used for the rapid and easy film preparation in a combinatorial approach. Upon variation of the ink composition or the printing parameters, a fast characterization of the film properties, including optical and topography, can be performed. In this way, structure-property relationships between ink composition, printing parameters and film qualities can be identified. In combination with the synthesis of various promising conjugated polymer materials, the loop from materials research to functional device properties can be closed. Inkjet printing of thin film libraries allows a combinatorial workflow from thin film preparation to structure-property relation

investigations. With this approach, the influence of ink composition, substrate properties, and different printing parameters to the film properties can be studied in a fast and reproducible way. Hereto the researchers have inkjet-printed libraries of various PPE-PPV copolymers and investigated their optical properties as a function of film thickness (see photo). By investigation of the film formation and the optical properties, these materials can be used for opto-electronic devices.

Inkjet-printed thin film libraries of a PPE-PPV copolymer

Building Business One Drop at a Time Martin Schoeppler, FUJIFILM Dimatix, Santa Clara, California

FUJIFILM Dimatix is a leading provider of industrial inkjet printheads and printing integration solutions and services. It is a leading provider of materials deposition printer products with substantial R&D and production capability, and in-house MEMS development and fabrication. It produces multiple inkjet printing technology platforms for application-specific printheads, and has 400 employees with a worldwide sales and support organization. The Dimatix experimental printer (DXP) has a precision air bearing stage with a 1 micron accuracy over 1 square meter travel. It is capable of up to 500mm/sec stage velocity, with a 0.5 micron resolution camera for image inspection. It is designed to utilize FUJIFILM Dimatix SAMBA printheads with less than 1pL drops.

The DXP experimental printer

Large Area Patterning of Conductors Utilizing Silver Nanoparticle Inks with Traditional Printing Processes Michael Mastropietro, PChem Associates, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

PChem Associates is a manufacturer of unique silver nanoparticles and printable conductor formulations. It enables cost effective production of electronic devices using conventional printing methods. The advantages are scalable low cost manufacturing process; low temperature high-speed processing; fabrication of thinner and higher resolution devices; reduced silver usage; and aqueous minimal VOC formulations. Silver nanoparticle inks printed using conventional methods can enable cost effective production of electronic devices: high-resolution printing; wide format printing; and good mechanical properties even at low film thicknesses.


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Highly-scaled Gravure-printed pBTTT OFET: Device Characteristics and Bias Stability Analysis Rungrot Kitsomboonloha, Alejandro de la Fuente, and Vivek Subramanian University of California, Berkeley, California

Using a high-speed printing technique, capable of running at several hundred feet per minute, the researchers have realized transistors suitable for use in a wide range of electronics applications. Thermal stresses strongly affect device characteristics and stability. These transistors represent some of the fastest switching fully-printed devices on plastics reported to date.

The goal is to design a small-scale sheet fed gravure system with high-resolution registration capability. Also need to

have: wide range of pressures, wide range of printing speeds, manage multiple gravure roll diameters, and possible electrostatic assist and substrate temperature control.

The Effects of Ductile Metal Interlayers on Mechanical Properties of TCO on Polymer Substrates Eun-Hye Kim, Chan-Woo Yang, and Jin Woo Park, Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea

The inherently brittle nature of the oxides under tension compensates such beneficial functional properties of TCO (ITO) by significantly limiting the flexibility of the substrates. Due to the different chemical and physical properties between TCO and polymeric substrates, internal or thermal residual stresses are induced during deposition. By inserting ductile metal interlayers, internal stress is reduced in ITO, and adhesion strength of ITO to polymer substrates is increased. However, fracture strength of ITO is increased by the interlayers only when the degree of crystallinity and the crystal qualities of ITO is improved by the interlayers. The cohesion strength of crystalline ITO is greater than a-ITO and is the predominant factor for improving crack resistance. The internal stress and surface roughness are secondary factors for the fracture strength compared to the good quality crystallinity of ITO.

Mechanical reliability between ITO and PET by internal stress

R2R Printed Electronics Walter Fix, PolyIC, Fürth, Germany

The company has produced a high-speed and high-resolution R2R production process: >30m/min with 10μm resolution, and >10.000 m2 per month. It is capable of R2R electrical testing with 30m/min. First products are on the way to markets. The company is also working on transparent conductive films, and printed TFE memory for stable, fast and complex printed circuits. It has produced 13MHz rectifiers with >10V DC output, low voltage circuits with <10V DC supply, and roll-to-roll printed 4-bit Manchester chip working at 13MHz.


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Electrical Sintering of Conductor Grids for Optoelectronic Devices Mark Allen, Ari Alastalo, Ismo Huhtinen, Mika Suhonen, Jaakko Leppäniemi, Tomi Mattila, and Heikki Seppä VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, Espoo, Finland

The presentation dealt with conductor grids in photovoltaics and OLED panels. Thin film technologies enabling optoelectronic devices on flexible substrates are OPV, CIGS, and DSSC for OLED lighting panels and displays, suited for manufacturing by R2R printing. They have similar device structures, but layer sequence varies. Conducting grid lines are in contact with TCE, which improves power conversion efficiency, improves homogeneity of brightness, enables low-cost transparent materials with conductivity lower than TCO. There is a trade-off between resistive losses and shadowing, but printing provides inherent cost benefits for patterning the low fill factor conductor grid. Sintering by oven curing is often problematic: it limits the choice of substrate and is

challenging to reach high conductivity on a fast processing line. Alternative sintering methods include laser sintering, pulsed light sintering, microwave sintering, chemical sintering, and rapid electrical sintering. Electrical sintering is a candidate technology for solving the drawbacks related to oven sintering. It is performed by applying a controlled electric field over the unsintered nanoparticle layer, and provides fast sintering (main transition in a few μs); reduced substrate heating (typically <100°C); energy-efficient processing; in situ monitoring; and excellent quality (50% of bulk conductivity demonstrated).

Next generation sintering heads

Roll-to-roll Manufacturing of Backplanes using Self-aligned Imprint Lithography (SAIL) Carl Taussig, Jim Brug, Bob Cobene, Rich Elder, Warren Jackson, Mehrban Jam, Albert Jeans, Hao Luo, John Maltabes, Ping Mei, Craig Perlov, Mark Smith, and Lihua Zhao, Hewlett-Packard, Palo Alto, California Frank Jeffrey, Marcia Almanza-Workman, Steve Braymen, Bob Garcia, Jason Hauschildt, Kelly Jung, Han-Jun Kim, Ohseung Kwon, Don Larson, and Dan Stieler, Phicot Inc, Ames, Iowa

HP and Phicot have demonstrated the world’s first R2R manufactured active matrix displays and are scaling the SAIL process to pilot manufacturing. The cost of R2R equipment follows similar scaling laws as panel based equipment but is much less expensive. For SAIL-based manufacturing wet and dry processes have similar total costs of ownership. But additive processing is not necessarily cheaper than subtractive. R2R manufacturing does not necessarily imply a fully-inline process. Substrates for R2R processing need further development. Different display applications require different combinations of electrical, mechanical, chemical, optical, and thermal properties. Defectivity and cleanliness of substrates needs improvement, but hybrid polymer substrates with inorganic coatings are attractive.

Imprint lithography in an R2R environment


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Large Area Processing Tools for Flexible Electronics Kaushal K. Singh, Applied Materials, Santa Clara, California

Applied Materials has over 50 years experience in R2R processing technology. The company is leveraging core competencies in R2R coating, large area coating and semiconductor device processing to enable large area R2R manufacturing solutions for the flexible electronic industry. The Smartweb has been developed to service the R2R PVD industry. A universal and modular R2R platform concept has been developed specifically for TF-Si based PECVD processes. Applied Materials have active R&D programs in Flex PV, Flex TFT and touch panels.

World’s largest R2R thin film deposition system: 4.5m web width, 20m/s speed, and 70km roll length

The MultiView compilation newsletters bring together the contributions of various regular contributors to the Veritas et Visus newsletters to provide a compendium of insights and

observations from specific experts in the display industry. http://www.veritasetvisus.com


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Smart Fabrics April 14-16, 2010, Miami, Florida

In the third of four reports, Phillip Hill covers presentations from Kimberly-Clark Corporation, Textile Testing & Innovation, EY Technologies, and Smart Garment People

Low Cost Conductive Nonwoven and its Applications Davis Nhan, and Susan Shawver, Kimberly-Clark Corporation, Irvine, Texas

Kimberly-Clark has developed a low cost conductive nonwoven (cNonwoven) by co-forming chopped carbon fibers with cellulose and/or synthetic material. The carbon fiber is 5-10 microns in diameter with fiber length of 3mm chopped. It is composed mostly of carbon atoms (92-95% purity). A typical cNonwoven material recipe is 10% carbon fiber, and 90% cellulosic pulp blend for final paper. Its thermal capabilities leverage the lower quality of the conductor – higher resistivity can mean a repurposed thermal element – cellulose fiber works as an insulator. Resistance can be tailored to a specific need – loading of carbon can dictate resistance of the element. It could give effective heating at low cost: $0.37/m2 @ 40gsm and 10% cFiber; $0.97/m2 @ 75gsm and 25% cFiber. Low cost

conductive material can be used as radiating elements as wearable antennae or RFID tags. The advantages are flexible design/layout of the radiating element can be incorporated into smart fabrics; and the potential to reduce cost of RFID tags – suited for case/pallet level tagging. cNonwoven is a cost effective and commercial raw material – a large-scale production run is complete (60 million tons). It is a simple material with wide range of capabilities geared to low-end semi-durable and disposable applications. It holds promise as a very flexible converting and end use substrate.

Magnified images of the constituents

Smart Cooling Textiles for Outdoor and Sports Applications Barbara Pause, Textile Testing & Innovation, Longmont, Colorado

The human body produces a substantial amount of heat during outdoor and sports activities. Heat needs to be released to prevent overheating, a serious health risk. Often heat cannot be released fast enough through the garment layers and the body reacts with perspiration. Moisture produced by the skin also needs to be released quickly through the garment layers in order to provide its cooling function. The solution is the application of phase change materials (PCMs), which cool by absorbing and storing the excessive body heat as soon as the microclimate temperature reaches a given trigger point. PCMs (paraffins or salt hydrates) are embedded in a polymeric


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compound that can be either coated onto a textile or formed into a film and laminated to a textile. A substantial amount of heat generated by the body is released through the head. The closed structure of the common ski helmet limits the heat transfer and prevents the moisture transfer through it into the environment. Overheating and a rise in perspiration around the head leads to discomfort and health risks. In a ski helmet with PCM cooling, the PCM absorbs latent heat above 30°C (86°F). The PCM is embedded in a 2mm (0.08 inch) thick film (with a textile backing), which is laminated onto the inside of the helmet. The benefits are PCM absorbs excess heat, keeps microclimate temperature in the comfort range, and, therefore, prevents perspiration. The soft structure of the PCM film enhances protection against impact.

Temperature development inside the ski helmet: before the test (left); after the test without PCM cooling (middle); and after the test with PCM cooling (right)

Highly Conducting Micro Filaments for Wearable Electronics Rathna Perera, and Gerry Mauretti, EY Technologies, Fall River, Massachusetts

“μWires for Wearable Electronics” is a joint venture between EY Technologies and the United States Army. Central to the e-textile is the ultra fine wires that are suitable for the textile industry. The metal core provides the conductivity, the polymer provides the multi functionality. EY has introduces wearable conductors as fibers, single micro filaments, multi filament bundles, and constructed yarns. The EY μWire core material is metal (silver based) or metal alloys, which are highly conductive, price competitive, non-toxic, fatigue resistant, easily soldered, and easily connected. The clad is nylon, PC, PET, PP, fluropolymer, or PFA. The properties of conductive fabrics are processable on standard textile equipment; no special processing equipment needed; easy dyeing, finishing, heat treating; variety of integrated colors/fluorescents; conductor visible or invisible; and single filament/multi filament option. The fiber can be used as strain gauge sensors, temperature sensors, and structural integrity monitors. μWires provide new ways to integrate electrical conduit into textile without losing its intrinsic properties. A variety of custom designed highly conducting μWires are now available. A wide range of wearable military gadgets and civilian products are expected to emerge soon. Washable and wearable computers could soon be a reality.

60-micron conducting filament

Smart Garment PPE Developments Cath Rogan, Smart Garment People, Liverpool, England

PPE is personal protective equipment. Smart garments are created by smart fabrics and/or new textile and garment manufacturing technologies. True “smart fabrics” can both sense and react to changes in their environment. “Smart garments” can react and interact with wearers and/or environments. Nanoparticles have a massive surface area relative to their size. A teaspoon of nanoparticles has roughly the same surface area as 10 football pitches. Nanoparticles are packed with highly reactive surface atoms. They display greatly exaggerated behavior compared to bulk form. They create a very big effect from a very small amount. Nanostructured surfaces create highly


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repellent or highly adhesive surfaces. They are well established in sportswear. A new application can prevent particles (e.g. pathogens/toxins) adhering to fabrics. Ultra-hydrophobic surfaces are new “nano finishes” that create ultra water and oil repellent surfaces without affecting drape or handle. Self-detoxifying fabrics are metal oxide nanoparticles, halamines and QACs being used to neutralize threats and reduce cross-contamination risk. In moisture responsive fibers, as they absorb moisture, fibers swell and open the structure, increasing breathability and speed of evaporative cooling. Super absorbent polymers absorbs and hold many times their original volume of moisture, and can be used for evaporative cooling. With shape-memory polymers, as temperature rises, the polymer reacts causing more “diffusion” paths to open and more moisture vapor to escape. Phase change materials regulate temperature by storing and releasing latent heat. Selectively permeable membranes can be a number of combinations: bi-component membranes with both micro-porous and hydrophilic layers; hybrid structures with an activated charcoal layer laminated to a breathable membrane; membranes that have been “functionalized” to repel, adsorb or neutralize specific threats.

In shape-memory polymers, as temperature rises, the polymer reacts causing more “diffusion” paths to open and more moisture vapor to escape. Left: structure below activation temperature. Right: structure above

activation temperature.

We strive to supply truth (Veritas) and vision (Visus) to the display industry. We do this by providing readers with pertinent, timely and exceptionally affordable information about the technologies, standards, products, companies and development trends in the industry. Our five flagship newsletters cover:

3D displays Display standards High resolution displays Touch screens Flexible displays

If you like this newsletter, we’re confident you’ll also find our other newsletters to be similarly filled with timely and useful information.

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FINETECH JAPAN April 14-16, 2010, Tokyo, Japan

In the second of three reports, Phillip Hill covers presentations from Merck Chemical Limited, E Ink, and Epistar Corporation

Merck Organic Semiconductor Materials Giles Lloyd, Merck Chemical Limited, Southampton, England

Merck is the world’s leading supplier of liquid crystals for LCDs in flat screen TVs, notebooks and PC monitors, mobile telephones as well as numerous consumer electronic devices and navigation systems. The company also offers organic light-emitting materials for OLEDs and new light sources. Mass production of organic plastic products has not yet been achieved. Unique new features for market breakthrough will be flexible substrates plus low cost manufacturing (printing). First applications to enter the market are flexible displays and organic photovoltaics. Future potential as a disruptive technology is as a-Si replacements in display panels (LCD/OLED), solar and RFIDs. A new organic semiconductor has been developed by Merck. It has high peak performance, peak mobility values in the range 4-5cm2/Vs, and excellent potential for high value applications such as OLED and AMLCD driving. But off currents are high (on/off ratios can be between 100-1000); uniformity is low (mobility typically between 0.1 and 5cm2/Vs); and viscosity is low (soluble small molecules have low molecular weight with low potential for printed electronics). Can formulation design improve this?

The presenter discussed formulation design techniques. For a specific organic semiconductor, there is selection of optimum solvent systems (boiling point, viscosity, surface tension for the relevant deposition technique), and selection of optimum additive systems. Considerations are deposition system – IJ, flexo, spin, etc.; orthogonal with existing layers; formulation/substrate interactions – good wetting, non-reticulating; topology – level films; morphology and crystallinity – evaporation and drying, and controlled crystallization. Development activities at Merck target printable formulation concepts for organic semiconductor and dielectric materials. Flexo printing enables high volume deposition of OE materials for mass production. “Lisicon” formulations are optimized according to customer specification for deposition conditions. Optimization is performed using industrial-compatible equipment. Lab-scale development is achieved using the “Flexiproof” system. A5-scale, pre-production demonstration was achieved using the Angstromer S15 Standard from Nissha (Inuma Gauge).

A5-scale, pre-production demonstration has been achieved

How Electrophoretic Display Technology is Changing the World of Reading Michael McCreary, E Ink, Cambridge, Massachusetts

E Ink’s EPLaR process (Electronics on Plastic by Laser Release) utilizes a 10mm flexible coated polyimide substrate. It uses 95% of the same process steps and equipment as conventional glass TFT EPDs. Multiple sizes have been demonstrated (1.9, 6, 8, and 9.7 inches). The 9.7-inch has 825x1200 pixels at 150ppi. McCreary discussed touch for flexible displays. Touch screens should not degrade the paper-like look and reflectivity.


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Resistive and capacitive touch screens generally absorb additional light and reduce the brightness of reflective displays, but they are getting better. Inductive touch screens do not add any surfaces in front of the display but require a pen input device. Thin flexible EPD front panels are compatible with new novel touch sensors integral to backplanes. E Ink was acquired by Prime View International in late December 2009. PVI was E Ink’s biggest customer prior to the merger. In 2005 PVI acquired the EPD business of Philips. In 2008 it acquired Hydis (Korea) to expand capacity. The E Ink takeover was to integrate the supply chain. Electrophoretic displays have emerged as the preferred display technology for electronic readers and other portable reading devices. E-paper is rapidly growing to a multi-billion dollar market. Electronic books have gained acceptance and momentum. Segmented applications continue to expand. Tablet PCs have again been launched with LCDs and have lots of functionality but not a paper-like reading experience. There is glare and very low contrast in high lighting environments such as outdoors. They are heavy to hold – glass displays are part of the issue. They have limited battery life and need to be recharged at least daily. Next-generation E Ink EPD technology will further enhance EPDs: flexible, lightweight displays; higher performance inks (reflectivity and contrast ratio); full color electrophoretic displays; and near video rate displays.

The Samsung Aloas II cell phone with flex keypad. The phone opens two different ways to enable standard cell phone or QWERTY keyboard use; PVI’s EPLaR process: 9.7-inch 825x1200 pixel 150ppi display

Epi Capacity in Taiwan – from Manufacturing to Innovation Chao Nien Huang, Epistar Corporation, Hsinchu, Taiwan

In the manufacturing cluster in Taiwan, there is currently a large capacity and well-established infrastructure to enable LED manufacturing to drive the transition of the lighting industry. A white light AC LED chip with luminous efficacy of 86lm/W has been developed. Also, the design of a monolithic HV LED chip will not only improve wall plug efficiency by 10% but will also reduce the circuit/package related costs. By using a hybrid white LED approach, a high efficacy warm white is achieved with CRI of 90 and efficacy up to 106.8lm/W. Some innovative approaches like phosphor on chip (PoC) and system on chip (SoC) have been developed. These can help to further broaden application scope by integrating various functions of chips into one single component.


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http://www.flextech.org/fe-flex-conference.aspx


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Flexible Electronics & Displays Conference February 1-4, 2010, Phoenix, Arizona

In the fourth report on this FlexTech Alliance event, Phillip Hill covers presentations from University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign, Philips Research Europe, Endicott Interconnect

Technologies, HP Laboratories, and Novacentrix

Conformal, Bio-Interfaced Forms of Silicon Electronics for Cardiology and Neurology John A. Rogers, University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign, Urbana, Illinois

Rogers stated the problem: conventional high performance electronics are rigid, planar and brittle, thereby restricting application possibilities. The solution is to find new ways to use old materials that enable new, stretchable forms of electronics, with performance equal to conventional systems. The opportunity is that this class of technology can be used for many new areas of application, with important implications. Rogers described a stretchable form of single crystal silicon (old research). He went on to describe recent developments in bio-interfaced electronics for cardiac electrophysiology, and bio-resorbable electronics (Si CMOS on silk). Single crystalline inorganic semiconductor ribbons and wires represent promising materials for unusual electronics. Printing-like techniques can be used to form devices and circuits using these materials as solid inks. These materials and integration schemes provide routes to new classes of bio-interfaced silicon electronics for biomedical applications.

Stretchable silicon integrated circuits; Bio-interfaced electronics for cardiac electrophysiology

Directions in Medical Applications for Flexible Electronics Harald Reiter, Philips Research Europe, Eindhoven, The Netherlands

According to Philips, the definition of personal healthcare is: “Technology in, on, and around the body that frees care from formal institutions: provides healthcare away from traditional delivery points; empowers individuals to manage their health in a personalized fashion; provides monitoring, treatment and preventative care.” The presentation dealt with the architecture of technical systems to allow medical services outside hospitals. The presentation discussed disease management solutions developed in MyHeart and HeartCycle, two prominent


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European integrated projects, which involve measurements of vital signs for patients per day only twice: 15 minute morning session, and 15 minute evening session. No continuous monitoring is required. Requirements are less challenging, and advanced technical solutions using systems with garments and connected electronics are preferred. Form factors are suited to garments: small sizes with shape adapted to wearing location. Reiter then went on to cover the other approach: integration in daily life with continuous monitoring and intelligent biomedical clothes.

24/7 monitoring applications provide the highest potential for use of flexible technology with integration in clothes and wearables. User acceptance is key: ease-of-use, no maintenance, automatic operation. There are still many challenges: washability, power supplies, etc. Technology is an enabler, but successful implementation and introduction of services will have to be based on evidence and on the acceptance by all stakeholders.

First realized textile system for men: integrated dry electrodes based on conductive rubber using sweat as the electrolyte. It is very robust (fully

washable, more than 30 washing cycles), to be worn around chest or waist.

Factor Effect Study for the High Cyclic Bending Fatigue of Thin Films on PET Substrate Khalid Alzoubi, Susan Lu, and Bahgat Sammakia, Binghamton University, Vestal, New York Mark Poliks, Endicott Interconnect Technologies, Endicott, New York

Electronic systems are vulnerable to failures caused by mechanical and thermal stresses. For electronic systems on flexible substrates repeated stresses below the ultimate tensile strength or even below the yield strength will cause failures in the thin films. It is known that mechanical properties of thin films are different from those of bulk materials; therefore, it is difficult to extrapolate bulk material properties on thin film materials. The objectives of this research are studying the failure mechanisms of thin-film substrate structure when subjected to fatigue bending loading and characterizing the failures in the thin films by obtaining high magnification images periodically during each test to study the crack initiation and propagation in the metal layer. The effect of five treatments including temperature, humidity, bending diameter, film thickness, and frequency were studied. The analysis of variance has revealed that the main effects of temperature and bending diameter have the greatest influence on the response. It was found that in sputtered copper samples, cracks initiate at the copper layer at the center of the sample and then

propagate toward the edges. It is necessary to consider these factors through running the web over a large diameter rolls with a minimum number of web travels over the rollers. Precise control of temperature and humidity is also necessary.

Failures in copper thin films

Enhancement of Flexible Color Filter Array Production by Imprint Lithography Methods Ed Holland, HP Laboratories, Palo Alto, California

The presentation dealt with project goals; R2R imprint lithography; templates for inkjet color filters; structural characterization; inkjet deposition and filter characterization; and future activities. The project is a collaboration between HP Labs and the Flexible Display Center (FDC) to develop color filters to match reflective display prototypes: 3.8-inch 640x480, 120μm square pixels. The aim is to use imprint lithography to create well defined “inkwells” for color filter materials, and enable deposition of color media by inkjet. The aim is to demonstrate


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flexible color displays using an assembly of filter arrays to an E Ink display backplane. Imprint study results show that many features are well reproduced without spurious defects. Difficulties arise with very narrow walls − 1μm and 2μm wall widths failed to release, irrespective of feature height. It may be addressed later with revised stamp tooling. There were some filling defects − 12μm step height features are occasionally incomplete. There is a wide range of usable template wall designs: all combinations with 4-10μm widths and 2-12μm heights. Future activities will involve moving from test imprint structures to full size arrays − 640x480 wells (76.8x57.6mm); integration of filter panels with E Ink display backplanes; accurate matching of filter array dimensions; filter alignment during assembly, bonding; evaluate & correct filter characteristics, color gamut, chromaticity and lightness parameters; modify pigment density, etc. for optimum performance; and fabrication of display demonstrator units.

Imprint process tooling; Imprint examples: 2μm wide walls, 6μm height. Features torn upon release from imprint stamp.

Evaluation of Tool for Processing Copper-Based Ink on Low-Temperature Substrates Stan Farnsworth, Novacentrix, Austin, Texas

PulseForge tools for drying and curing are designed to enable the development and manufacturing of high-performance printed electronics applications. Inks and thin films can be dried, sintered, or annealed in milliseconds on flexible or rigid substrates. PulseForge tools work by utilizing intense, pulsed light to heat thin films to a high temperature for a very brief amount of time. The power density is very high; the total energy is low. Thermally fragile substrates are unaffected. PulseForge tools are the next step beyond Rapid Thermal Processing (RTP). The PulseForge tools create a non-equilibrium thermal condition, with the inks taken to hotter temperatures than the substrates. Processing includes drying, sintering, annealing, and densification: silver, copper, and other novel metals; semiconductors and other non-metals; and polymers. It enables the use of very low temperature and flexible substrates: PET, PVC, etc., and papers. It is compatible with all major print and deposition methods, and capable of high-speed roll-to-roll manufacturing, up to 1000 feet per minute.

PulseForge tools use a novel industrial process called photonic curing for rapidly sintering thin films, such as metallic and semiconductor inks, on low temperature substrates. The basis of PulseForge tools is the use of intense pulsed light from plasma discharge lamps to briefly heat the film without affecting the substrate. It reduces or even eliminates the need for an oven to cure many materials. The process is able to cure materials that cannot ordinarily be thermally processed in air such as sintering a copper particle film. The process is broadcast by nature and maskless, with no need for registration. The millisecond timeframe, high power, and deep UV spectrum of the tool makes it ideal for high speed processing applications for materials even beyond metal inks. PulseForge tools often outperform ovens and are much more scalable than laser processing. Low temperature materials such as cellulose and PET are now feasible substrates for high-performance printed electronics applications.


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Wednesday 26 January

Session 1: Flexible Displays and Electronics: Time: 8:00 AM - 10:05 AM

Human factors and optical design considerations for mobile display applications Author(s): Ulrich Barnhoefer, Apple Inc. (US)

Printing technology for displays and electronic systems Author(s): Jurgen Daniel, Tse Nga Ng, Ana Claudia Arias, Leah Lavery, Sean M. Garner, Brent S. Krusor, Beverly Russo, Palo Alto Research Center, Inc. (US)

Metal oxide transistor technology in rigid and flexible displays Author(s): Warren B. Jackson, Hewlett-Packard Labs. (US); Randy L. Hoffman, Bao Yeh, Hewlett-Packard Co. (US); Ohseung Kwon, Han-Jun Kim, Hewlett-Packard Labs. (US)

Single-grain Si TFTs for high-speed flexible electronics Author(s): Ryoichi Ishihara, Technische Univ. Delft (Netherlands)

Exploring polymer ferroelectric transistors and diodes for flexible optoelectronics Author(s): Gerwin H. Gelinck, Holst Ctr.,TNO Science and Industry (Netherlands)

Session 2: Electrowetting Displays: Time: 10:30 AM - 11:45 AM

Electrowetting: a flexible e-paper technology Author(s): Andrew J. Steckl, Univ. of Cincinnati (US)

Electrofluidic displays: new developments now include record brightness for bistable e-paper Author(s): Jason C. Heikenfeld, Univ. of Cincinnati (US)

Bistable electrowetting displays Author(s): Karlheinz Blankenbach, Pforzheim Univ. (Germany); Juergen Rawert, adt Deutschland GmbH (Germany)

Session 3: E-Paper Display Technologies and Applications: Time: 1:00 PM - 3:05 PM

Flexible displays as key for high-value and unique automotive design Author(s): Robert Isele, BMW Group Research and Technology (Germany)

Improvements in in-plane electrophoretic displays Author(s): Alex Henzen, IREX Technologies (Netherlands)

Electrophoretic display technologies for e-book readers: system integration aspects Author(s): Philippe Gentric, Texas Instruments France (France)


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Thin and light weight flexible electronic paper display using QR-LPD technology Author(s): Ryo Sakurai, Bridgestone Corp. (Japan)

Other display related events at the SPIE Photonics West event:

Emerging Liquid Crystal Technologies VI Dates: Tuesday-Wednesday 25 - 26 January 2011 http://spie.org//app/program/index.cfm?fuseaction=conferencedetail&export_id=x13090&ID=x7805&redir=x7805.xml&conference_id=929627&event_id=894273&programtrack_id=929638

Advances in Display Technologies Dates: Thursday 27 January 2011 http://spie.org//app/program/index.cfm?fuseaction=conferencedetail&export_id=x13090&ID=x7805&redir=x7805.xml&conference_id=929629&event_id=894273&programtrack_id=929638

Practical Holography XXV: Materials and Applications Dates: Sunday-Wednesday 23 - 26 January 2011 http://spie.org//app/program/index.cfm?fuseaction=conferencedetail&export_id=x13090&ID=x7805&redir=x7805.xml&conference_id=929630&event_id=894273&programtrack_id=929638

Toner display based on particle control technologies Author(s): Takashi Kitamura, Chiba Univ. (Japan)

Session 4: Reflective LCD Technologies: Time: 3:30 PM - 4:20 PM

A wide-view transflective display using polymer-stabilized blue-phase liquid crystal Author(s): Yan Li, Meizi Jiao, Shin-Tson Wu, CREOL, The College of Optics and Photonics, Univ. of Central Florida (US)

Achromatic reflection by long-pitch chiral-nematic liquid crystal and its application to displays switchable between reflective and transmissive modes Author(s): Tae-Hoon Yoon, Ki-Han Kim, Dong Han Song, Jae-Chang Kim, Pusan National Univ. (Korea)

Session 5: Flexible OLEDs: Time: 4:20 PM - 6:00 PM

(In)Flexible OLEDs: from prototypes to applications Author(s): Stefan Monz, Konrad Wolf, Hildegard Möbius, Fachhochschule Kaiserslautern (Germany); Karlheinz Blankenbach, Pforzheim Univ. (Germany)

Novel solutions for thin film layer deposition of organic materials Author(s): Juergen Kreis, AIXTRON AG (Germany)

Recent progress of flexible AMOLED displays Author(s): Huiqing Pang, Kamala Rajan, Jeff A. Silvernail, Prashant Mandlik, Ruiqing Ma, Michael G. Hack, Julie J. Brown, Universal Display Corp. (US)

Polymer electronics solutions at Bayer MaterialScience Author(s): Karsten Dierksen, Bayer MaterialScience AG (Germany)

http://spie.org/opto


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IDW ’09 December 9-11, 2009, Miyazaki, Japan

In this fifth of five reports, Phillip Hill covers this conference organized by The Institute of Image Information and Television Engineers, and The Society for Information Display, with papers from the sessions on MEMS, OLEDs, and PDPs. Presentations from University of Cambridge/Nokia Research Centre, Sungkyunkwan University, Korea University/KAIST, Shinoda Plasma Co., Ltd., and Imaging

Systems Technology/University of Toledo

Patterning of Organic Insulator using Self-Assembled Monolayers for Organic Light-emitting Diodes Tae Hyun Park , Young Min Kim, Young Wook Park, Jin Hwan Choi, Jin-Wook Jeong, Hyun Ju Choi, and Byeong-Kwon Ju, Korea University, Seoul, South Korea; Kyung Cheol Choi, KAIST, Daejeon, South Korea

A self-assembled micro-array (SAMA) of OLEDs has been fabricated using self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) by micro-contact printing (μCP). The hydrophobic SAMs allow to form self-assembled micro-arrays spontaneously on the patterned SAMs. The macroscopic stamping, with the PDMS stamps by μCP can obtain microscopic patterns of the SAMs on the ITO anode of the OLEDs. In this way, the surface properties of the ITO anode can be manipulated, which are able to form the SAMAs on the patterned SAMs spontaneously. It has been demonstrated that local light-emission OLEDs can be fabricated on the micrometer scale, based on low cost and simple processes. In addition, the PDMS stamps are suitable for managing the patterning process on uneven surface substrates, as well as on 3-dimensional or flexible substrates, and they are also good repeatable processes since they are elastic and durable. Moreover, the PDMS stamps are able to be applied to the roll-to-roll process, which would allow the printing of large OLEDs sheets on conventional printing presses, for use in coating on plastic substrates. Consequently, the μCP does not need expensive vacuum equipment, high temperature processes, or UV exposure for the patterning. Therefore, μCP is considered a very simple and inexpensive process as a candidate for the next generation of patterning processes.

Optical microscopy images of emitting OLEDs using a printed SAM: (a) with 150μm SAMA; (b) with 8μm SAMA; (c), (d) without SAMA


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Extra Large Area Film Display with Plasma Tube Array Technology K. Shinohe, Guo Bingang, H. Hirakawa, M. Ishimoto, K. Awamoto, and T. Shinoda Shinoda Plasma Co., Ltd., Hyogo, Japan

The plasma tubes array is a film display that is emissive, ultra-thin, lightweight, flexible and has low power consumption. The researchers have developed a prototype display of 3x2m screen size. Previously the company had proposed the plasma tube array (PTA) technology that provides a unique structure and fabrication process for this kind of extra large area display. In this paper, the basic structure and advantages for extra large area displays in PTA are described and the 3x2m prototype is introduced. The PTA is composed by arranging the plasma tubes in RGB order according to phosphor emissions. The plasma tube has the same emission structure as PDPs, consists of phosphor layer, MgO protection layer, and discharge gas inside the thin glass tube. The display electrodes are formed on the plastic sheet, and they are contacted to the tube surface outside the tubes array. The diameter of the glass tube is designed to be 1mm to make the pixel pitch of the display to be 3mm that is a match for the image format of 720p in 150-inch class and that of 1080p in 250-inch class diagonal displays. The dielectric layer and the stripe ribs in PDPs are equivalent to the glass tubes in PTAs. The shape of the sustain electrode determined by the ITO pattern in PDPs is determined by the contact area of the electrodes and the glass tube surface in PTAs.

PTAs use glass tubes and plastic film substrates instead of the glass substrates. The thickness of the glass tube wall is about 100μm and the thickness of the plastic film is also 100μm. The weight of the combination of these materials is about 1.2 kg/m2 and this is almost 1/10th of the weight of a pair of the glass substrates for conventional FPDs.

Left: Glass tube array with plastic film. Right: Structure of the adhesion.

Flexible Array Sensors Based on Zinc Oxide Nanowires for Touch Displays Sieglinde M.-L. Pfaendler, Michael E. Swanwick, A. R. Rachamim, Sharvari H. Dalal, Sophie E. Machin, William I. Milne, and Andrew J. Flewitt, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, England Paul Beecher, and Piers Andrew, Nokia Research Centre, Cambridge, England

Recent efforts towards the fabrication of touch sensing systems are presented, in which zinc oxide nano-wire arrays are embedded in a polymer matrix to produce an engineered composite material. In the future, these sensor systems will be fully flexible and multi-touch as intended for Nokia’s “Morph” concept device. Future generations of mobile devices will be both fully flexible and integrate tactile control. Such tactile control will require simultaneous multi-touch sensing capability in which the applied force can be determined and distinguished from flexing. Commercial touch sensors based on capacitive or resistive technologies lend themselves poorly to such an application. Piezo-electric zinc oxide (ZnO) nano-wire sensors are a promising alternative technology. Recent efforts towards the understanding and fabrication of touch sensing systems are presented, in which zinc oxide nano-wire arrays are embedded in a polymer matrix to produce an engineered composite material. This system has the added benefit of promising optical transparency and biocompatibility whilst allowing for high frequency detection of touch at multiple points.

ZnO makes an ideal material for mobile device applications as it is transparent, inexpensive and flexible whilst having a large piezo-electric constant, suggesting that a significant charge separation is built up within the wire upon deformation of the ZnO nanowires. The piezo-electric constant and hence the signal amplitude will depend on the physical form that the ZnO takes, and the defect density. In this paper the fabrication and structural characterization of ZnO structures and the feasibility of using these wires in touch sensing applications are


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discussed. This is topical, because it has been debated whether the signal would be large enough for a sensing application, despite the results published from ZnO nano-generator systems.

Nokia’s “Morph” concept device. This futuristic device has haptic feedback, biosensors, is flexible so that it can wrap itself around the user’s wrist, and can unfold to reveal a larger screen area; Schematic of a touch-

sensor device. The sensor consists of a metal contact and seed layer that are sputtered onto the substrate, followed by ZnO nano-wire growth and a top contact.

Large-area OLED Lighting Fabricated by Screen Printing Hyun-Chul Shin, Kyung-Hee Lee, Dong-Hyun Lee, and Sung Min Cho Sungkyunkwan University, Seoul, South Korea

The researchers have successfully fabricated large-area OLED lighting using screen-printing. The fabricated OLED devices are 10x10cm and 20x20cm in size. They think that it is possible to realize large-area OLED lighting using full wet processes such as screen printing. Also they report the effect of organic salt doping. The lighting devices consist of pixels of 1x1cm size, which are separated with insulating polymers. In order to enhance the brightness of the lighting devices and diffuse the light, they printed a micro-lens array on the front side of the glass substrate. For all fabrication processes, screen printing was utilized except for the formation of the metal cathode.

EL emission from the 20x20cm device

Recent Progress in Color Plasma-Sphere Displays C. Wedding, E. Peters, J. Guy, O. Strbik, and J. Davis, Imaging Systems Technology, Toledo, Ohio D. Wedding, University of Toledo, Toledo, Ohio

Imaging Systems Technology (IST) has achieved significant progress in color plasma-sphere displays. To date IST has demonstrated red, blue, and green plasma-spheres that produce a peak white of 1700cd/m2. Color plasma-spheres have a good memory margin and priming. They will be used to make low cost large area displays for digital billboards. Due to low fabrication costs, plasma displays have the potential to provide strong competition to LEDs. However, conventional plasma displays have limited ability to address this market because they are fabricated with large rigid glass substrates. This structure makes them difficult to fabricate, transport, and install. If the rigid glass substrates can be eliminated, plasma displays will provide a high quality low cost alternative to LED displays. There are a number of development efforts focused on flexible plasma displays. In Japan, Shinoda Plasma has produced a large tube array (see article above). In Korea, KAIST, Hoseo University and Korea Polytechnic University are exploring different aspects of flexible plasma displays including an organic plasma display. In the United States the University of Illinois and IST are exploring several approaches to flexible plasma displays. The


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University of Illinois is developing flexible micro discharge plasma displays and IST has produced flexible plasma displays using hollow gas encapsulating shells called plasma-spheres.

In the figure, the plasma-sphere display is comprised of multiple hollow shells called plasma-spheres (3c) that encapsulate an ionizable gas. Each shell is comprised of a dielectric with a highly uniform diameter and thickness formed using IST’s proprietary processes. Because the pressurized gas is contained in a hollow shell, the substrate (4c) does not need to be rigid or impermeable. Nor does it require a top substrate. Additionally, because the plasma-sphere defines the crucial parameters of gap and dielectric thickness, critical tolerances are not required for the

substrate. Essentially, the critical parameters in a conventional plasma display have been moved from the substrate to the less complex plasma-sphere, resulting in greater flexibility. Plasma-spheres can be configured with gas pressures above one atmosphere, and with two, three, or more electrode configurations.

Diagram of the plasma-sphere display

Printed Electronics USA December 1-4, 2009, San Jose, California

In the fifth of five reports, Phillip Hill covers presentations from Navigant Consulting, Asahi Kasei E-materials Corporation, NanoMas Technologies, and University of Michigan

Flexo Printing Technology for Printed Electronics Applications Koshi Okita, Asahi Kasei E-materials Corporation, Tokyo, Japan

Okita gave a summary of conventional flexo technology. The good points (for printed electronics) are high productivity; printing speed of state of the art printer is over 500m/min; printing speed is widely stable (from 2-3m/min); simple process and low stress for the substrate; plate doesn’t touch anywhere except printing area; low printing pressure; various substrates can be printed – substrate film, glass, paper; uneven substrate is also applicable. The issues are the limited solvent resistance of the plate, the fact that it is impossible to use electronics ink that contains toluene or other aggressive solvents, limited registration, and the plate elongates when it is mounted on the cylinder. The company’s solution is ADLESS, which has good solvent registration, realizes high resolution and high registration printing, with flexography applications: alignment layers, RFID, OLED, color filters. Gravure application uses silver paste printing as the electrode.

Flexo R&D precision printer for color filters: printing size 600x600mm


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Genuinely Nano Materials for Printed Electronic Devices John Hannafin, NanoMas Technologies, Endicott, New York

Highly conductive and high-resolution patterns fabricated using low-cost and high throughput processes (such as inkjet and gravure printing) are one of the most critical technology components in making printed electronics and displays. The requirements are high performance and high conductivity (close to pure metal); low temperature processing; plastic compatible; printability – solution processed with “high” resolution patterning; high throughput – fast curing; mechanically robust; adhesion to substrates; tolerance to mechanical deformation; and low cost.

Nanoparticles can be stabilized in ink solutions by organic ligand shells, which can be removed after printing. Nanoparticles can be further cured or sintered to highly conductive films at low temperatures. Unique all solution based nanoparticle synthesis technology (patent pending) is widely compatible with the low cost production processes in the chemical industry: low cost and fully scalable to large-scale mass production. Ultra-small nanoparticle size (2 to 10nm) with specially designed surface chemistry allows low annealing temperature, short process time, and high conductivity. It allows a variety of surface chemistry for different solvent dispersion and applications: low resistivity (as low as ~2.3μΩ-cm, 1.5x of pure Ag); low process temperature (as low as ~70°C) compatible with most plastic substrates; and also curable by laser or UV light at room temperature.

In terms of solar cell metallization, the advantages of using NanoMas special solar inks and pastes are low temperature processing (<250°C) compatible with most thin-film solar cell technologies, high-resolution printing

enabling better efficiency, and excellent electric contact and mechanical adhesion with silicon, glass, and ITO

Thin Film PV Markets: Thin Films Can Do Anything Crystalline Can Do Paula Mints, Navigant Consulting, Palo Alto, California

Raw material suppliers of silicon, tellurium, indium, silane, machinery, consumables, etc. are suppliers to the technology manufacturers. The supply side of the market is the PV technology manufacturers of crystalline, and thin film cells and modules, specifically, and the development and manufacture of the technology. This group is also the demand side for raw material and machinery suppliers. The demand side of the market is the module assemblers, the distributors, the installers, system integrators, dealers, and retailers, and sometimes the other technology manufacturers who buy the technology either as a cell or a module. This group is the first point of sale in the market. This group is the supply side for the end user. The end user can be a residential or commercial system buyer, an investor in a system where the electricity will be sold, a utility, or the buyer of the PV generated electricity. The market for PV products continues to be driven by incentives. The manufacturers’ customer for PV cells and modules is the PV selling channel. The PV selling channel is made up of system integrators, installers, retailers, module assemblers, dealers, distributors and those installing systems and selling electricity (instead of systems). Thin film technologies were long thought of by the selling channel as unreliable and so failed to gain share. During the boom (2004 to 2008), which coincided with a severe silicon raw material shortage, thin films gained traction in the market. With lower demand, growing supplies of silicon feedstock and low prices for c-Si, thin films are facing significant competition. To be competitive in the market, all technologies need lower manufacturing cost, conversion efficiency of at least 10%, reliability, and industry standard lifetime of 25 years. To


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develop a BIPV market, form factor and product development (along with technology development) will become crucial.

In the early days, demand was into the off grid applications, remote industrial,

habitation and consumer power. Consumer indoor (watches, calculators)

grew rapidly in the early 1980s, matured rapidly, with growth slowing to ~8% a year. In the late 1990s growth in

the grid connected application accelerated and now dominates.

Assuming that the global market will absorb excess module product is problematic, particularly considering the current global economic situation, housing downturn in the US and Japan, continued need for incentives to drive demand – and, the availability of substitutes including energy efficiency. Solar electricity will narrow the affordability gap eventually. Until that time it needs long-term incentives to thrive. Manufacturing costs must decline, efficiencies must rise and the selling channel must be involved in the dialog as they set the price and have access to the end user. Both crystalline and thin film technologies contribute to the solar offering and as the industry matures the attributes of thin films and c-Si along with customer preference (low profile, for example, in the case of thin films) are the future. Technologies can also work together on the same site. The solar industry can and should get creative in combining technologies for the best customer outcome.

Large Area, Continuous, Roll-to-Roll Nanoimprinting & Dynamic NanoInscribing on Flexible Substrates Se-Hyun Ahn, and L. Jay Guo, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan

The presentation discussed roll-to-roll nano-imprint lithography (R2RNIL). Conventional NIL is still too slow for many applications due to the restriction of the imprinted area and its long processing time. The advantages in R2RNIL are continuous printing of very long patterns; a high-speed process without loading/unloading; “line-by-line” imprinting to give much smaller imprinting/releasing force. The challenges in R2RNIL are uniform pressure under dynamic situations; preparing a large-size roller mold; and stringent requirements on resist materials. As the illustrations show, dynamic nano inscribing (DNI) allows for printing of circular and free forms on curved surfaces.

700nm period gratings on a curved surface; concentric nano-gratings on ETFE


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Paper Electronics

by Peter Harrop

Dr Peter Harrop PhD, FIEE is chairman of IDTechEx Ltd. He was previously chief executive of Mars Electronics, the $260 million electronics company, and chairman of Pinacl plc, the $100 million fiber optic company. He has been chairman of over 15 high tech companies. He has written 14 books on technical subjects, these being published by the Financial Times, John Wiley and others. He lectures and consults internationally on RFID, smart labels, printed/organic electronics and smart packaging. http://www.idtechex.com

The largest event in the world on the subject Printed Electronics USA 2010 (http://www.IDTechEx.com/peUSA) will once again have a growing minority of presentations on paper electronics. This is the printing of electronics and electrics on or in paper. It is not to be confused with “electronic paper” which is invariably plastic but replaces conventional printing on paper. Indeed, today, most printed electronics takes place on high grade polyester film because most of the processes require very clean, flat surfaces. However, a high proportion of the products targeted are currently made of paper from magazines and healthcare disposables to packaging and posters. Printed Electronics USA has major users of printed paper such as JC Decaux in billboards, etc, MWV Packaging and Crayola in children's drawing equipment and toys saying what they need and what they are doing so far.

Smart packaging: Relevant work on printed sensors for smart packaging that is taking place at the University of California at Berkeley will be presented as will the printed electronic paper cards and packaging of Printechnologics in Germany. Information Mediary Corporation of Canada, famous for its compliance monitoring blister-packs for medicine that use paper and plastic, announces new printed electronics for smart packaging. Cubic and Kovio will cover printed electronics on plastic film that is then embedded in paper tickets and Isiqiri Interface Technologies of Germany covers large area photo-sensors for man-machine interfaces. Indeed, Dublin City University in Ireland presents on electrochemical and bio sensors in smart systems. Bayer of Germany covers its electroactive polymer haptic touch keyboards made with flexible printed electrodes. These can be embedded in paper products, high performance conformal electronics being covered by MC10 Inc.

Commercial products: There is an increasing interest in printing electronics on and in paper and commercial products have appeared such as the millions of paper gaming cards that interface with computers and mobile phones and the disposable electric skin patches that send in cosmetics using a printed paper battery and electrodes. Intrinsiq and Novacentrix can now print copper patterns on paper with a considerable potential saving in cost over silver for antennas, electrodes, sensors, switches, keyboards, conductors and meta-materials. The University of Helsinki has developed its own versions. Previously, printed copper would oxidize and become insulating and useless. Printed copper has a huge future but it will not replace all silver because it is not allowed in contact with food in marketed products, it can become electrochemically active and it poisons OLED displays for example.

In the laboratory: In the laboratory, much more is coming along. Electrochemical transistors have been printed onto paper by ACREO in Sweden and others and paper electronics, including transistors, is being researched by Abo Akademi in Finland and The University of Helsinki in Finland. Disposable medical testers made of paper with printed sensors and conductors are about to be launched. Biopolymers such as paper offer the possibility of creating electronics at very low costs that may even be biodegradable. On the other hand, the Swedish Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden has “cellulose nano-paper” that is stronger than cast iron that will be useful for long life, durable printed electronics.

Transistors, RFID and displays: Organic inks forming unusually flexible and conformal patterns are useful for printing on paper but, because of the challenging topology, the resulting transistors still have limited performance.


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Indeed, some take several seconds to switch. Polyera will present on printed light emitting transistors based on multi-stacking structures, a typical component that may first appear on plastic film then later on paper. Professor Margit Harting of the University of Cape Town in South Africa will describe crushed silicon diodes, thermistors and potentially transistors printed at very low cost onto paper. Nanogram describes printing of nano-silicon devices.

In Portugal, an elegant new zinc oxide field effect transistor with the paper substrate doubling as the gate dielectric layer has been developed by the New University of Lisbon. Remarkably, it has one hundred times the switching speed of amorphous silicon and organic transistors. Electronic paper is not all about cost reduction. Indeed, Kimberley Clark licenses its carbon impregnated paper process that can involve patterning to form heaters and they could activate electro-thermic displays printed on top.

The printed organic transistor RFID being developed by Sunchon University in Korea will be presented at the conference. Initially it involves plastic film substrates but one can see it being applied to paper later as there is no high temperature annealing stage required. South West NanoTechnologies covers novel carbon nanotube technology that enables high volume, low cost printing. The cost of carbon nanotubes is no longer a market constraint.

Batteries: Printed paper batteries from several manufacturers have been successful for some time. A new development here is large scale applications even including grid level power storage being developed by the Paper Battery Company Inc. which will present at Printed Electronics USA. Another development to be presented at this event comes from Uppsala University in Sweden in the form of a salt and paper battery involving low cost, environmental materials throughout.

Memory: De Montfort University in the UK has shown how gold nanoparticles and small organic molecules can be combined to provide non volatile memory in paper. Flexibility is a key benefit here and applications are envisaged in medicine packs that prompt when a new prescription is needed, and roll up computer screens.

Product integrators needed: The benefits of printed electronics particularly shine through when many components are printed on one, preferably flexible, substrate. That is happening with plastic film substrates printed reel to reel by companies such as Soligie and GSI. They are somewhat like silicon fabs in having a considerable repertoire of component printing capability and making complete products to the customer's designs. Not so with printed paper electronics where most developers have only one component they can print, and no one offers a product integration service based on a wide repertoire of components. This is an opportunity for new entrants.

Veritas et Visus

David Barnes, volume 13: 20 articles, 60 pages

MultiView



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OLEDs and ITO: Will there be a falling out?

by Lawrence Gasman

Lawrence Gasman is principal analyst and founder of NanoMarkets LC, in Glen Allen, Virginia. He has over 25 years of experience as a high-tech consultant for companies including Analog Devices, Cisco, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Intel, Fujitsu, NEC, Nortel and NTT, and is also the author of three books on telecommunications topics. He is also on the editorial board of the Foresight Nanotech Institute and is a regular speaker at various nanotechnology and display related conferences. http://www.nanomarkets.net

The OLED community-especially OLED lighting-has been one of the strongest proponents of developing alternatives to ITO. This creates the opportunity for firms

supplying ITO alternatives to turn the OLED space into a test-bed for their products. Given that the conventional LCD display business is so committed to ITO, OLEDs look like a good place to start for ITO alternative firms; a niche that welcomes ITO alternatives but seems set to grow into something bigger given time.

This encouraging environment has to be balanced by the fact that while the OLED industry may be more open than other places that ITO is sold, for the time being it uses primarily ITO and for all the reasons one might expect. ITO is widely available and high performing, and its widespread use in the LCD display industry has resulted in very good understanding of its deposition processes. ITO wins the first round because it is easy. In the race to commercialization time is money, and using ITO allowed these devices to be commercialized more quickly than would be the case with a less available or less understood material. To put it crudely, the OLED industry has enough concerns without having to mess with novel transparent conductors. The ITO alternative suppliers should be encouraged by the psychology of this market, not by its current realities.

So the big question for ITO alternative firms who see revenue generating potential in the OLED space is "for how long will ITO keep a stranglehold on OLEDs?" Indeed, given that the openness of the OLED market to new materials is proof of nothing, they must actually ask themselves the question as to whether no-ITO transparent conductors will make significant inroads in the OLED sector?

The answer to these questions we believe will depend on the segment of the OLED industry to which they are addressed, but we believe that in the next few years some segments of the OLED industry have the potential to generate enough revenues for suppliers of ITO alternatives to take notice. This will be especially true for smaller firms that have been looking for proofs of concept for a while now and have had a rough time in the last couple of years, often relying on government contracts rather than industrial sales. But we think also that there is enough here to be encouraging to larger materials firms too; at least the ones that have adopted strategies that allow them to enter niche businesses.

Such firms should, however, enter these markets cautiously. While we think the opportunities are there, few if any OLED firms are going to make an immediate leap to OLEDs, although we expect a steady transition, with, perhaps some OLED pioneer firms paving the way in a year or so. Today, most OLED manufacturers are comfortable with ITO, but find it expensive. And the ITO alternatives that are available now can be challenging in terms of performance. We would not expect big leaps in the success for ITO alternative manufacturers in the OLED space until nanomaterials become available in reasonable quantities and with suitable pricing and performance.

AM OLED products: impact on the transparent conductor market: The vibrant colors from the first active matrix OLED displays certainly helps their competitive stance against conventional LCD displays and the manufacturers of the cell phones that now use these new AM OLED displays have made a big deal out them in their promotional activity. However, for the time being it is precisely this that strengthens AM OLED displays' ties to ITO, since it is currently the best performing electrode material for the job. Compromising transparency with a


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lower-performing transparent conductor would diminish AM OLEDs' competitive advantage and hence this is not a realistic route for cost reduction at this time.

Thus Firms supplying the latest generation of AM OLEDs to the cell phone industry are going to have to be convinced that they should switch horses in the transparent conductor space right now, although they are likely to make the switch once their product niche becomes more competitive and materials come to matter more and better transparent conductors become available. This is the area where the nanomaterial-based transparent conductors will have their first turn in OLED space.

The larger AM OLED space - especially OLED TVs - is so ill developed at the present time that it is impossible to say with any certainty what road it will adopt for moving away from ITO. Presumably most of the comments on the smaller AM OLED displays used in cell phones will apply, although we would expect the use of non-ITO materials in OLED TVs to be slower than in OLED cell phones, because of the different price points and importance of visual quality, which are greater in both cases for TVs.

What would flexible OLED products mean for transparent conductors? The emergence of flexible OLED products might be expected to lead to a mass exodus from ITO for the OLED industry, but that will not be the result. Flexible OLED products will initially be low in volume, minimally flexible, and, if portable, limited in lifetime. ITO's relatively low level of flexibility will be enough for these semi-flexible devices, as well as for OLEDs built on flexible substrates for roll-to-roll processing purposes but then made rigid.

However, NanoMarkets expects this situation to change significantly in the next few years. A compelling case can be made for rollable or foldable displays in a world of ubiquitous computing and sophisticated mobile devices that could use larger displays. It is also very much part of the OLED lighting roadmap that flexible lighting products should become available; although admittedly flexible lighting won't be flexed as much as displays.

Certainly the OLED display makers have been demonstrating flexible displays for quite a few years and even sometimes claiming that they will be in production "soon." However, as yet no commercially available intrinsically flexible display has appeared.

Opportunities for transparent conductive polymer makers in the OLED space: If highly flexible products make ITO's brittleness an issue, the quickest solution would likely be to use conductive polymers as the electrode material. This has the advantage of using a material already established in the process-conductive polymers are already used as the hole injection layer (HIL)-so that the supply chain already exists. But making this advantage even stronger is the fact that this conductive polymer HIL is actually adjacent to the ITO electrode; a process may be easily developed that does little more than skip the ITO deposition step and add metallic bus bars or fingers to assist with conductivity.

Thus, we believe that conductive polymer suppliers have the best opportunities to capitalize on the first highly flexible OLED products. But, of course, the opportunities for these firms in the OLED space go further than this. They can obviously make an excellent case that major cost savings can be achieved using their polymers both in terms of the actual materials and in terms of lower cost deposition techniques; coating the material onto devices instead of using the vacuum deposition methods typical of ITO and other TCOs. But the marketing of these firms will have to also address the issue of transparency and conductivity. Where the performance drop from using tin oxide or zinc oxide instead of ITO might not be noticed on a PM OLED display or an OLED lighting panel, the larger drop resulting from the use of conductive polymers may well be noticed.

There would be many firms that could benefit from a trend towards using conductive polymers in the OLED space; although we would emphasize that such a trend is by no means assured. However, the two firms that would seem to be the largest beneficiaries of such a move would certainly be Agfa and Heraeus. Agfa has been targeting its Orgacon PEDOT material at the OLED space for some time both for the ITO anode layer in OLED devices, and to


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function as an HIL material. In fact, Agfa has been able to get some notoriety in this regard through its involvement in the Fast2Light program, which proudly announced in April 2009, the demonstration of a 12 by 12 cm white OLED tile using Orgacon PEDOT:PSS in conjunction with printed metallic shunting lines, without the need for an ITO layer.

It seems that if interest in ITO alternatives grows in the OLED space, Agfa will be one of the first firms to jump on the opportunity. The future of Heraeus in this space is less certain, since it is new to this business having recently acquired the OLED materials business of H.C. Starck.

Opportunities for selling non-ITO transparent conducting oxides in the OLED space: Conductive polymers are not likely to be the first non-ITO products to take off in the OLED space. Initially, the greatest the beneficiary of any doubts that OLED makers may have about ITO is likely other transparent conducting oxides (TCOs), zinc oxide and tin oxide, very mundane materials as transparent conductors go, but probably suitable for at least some low-end OLED applications, with the choice of substitution away from ITO being based entirely on price grounds. This strategy may make perfect sense in the passive matrix OLED and (eventually) the OLED lighting spaces, where cost is everything.

For OLED manufacturers, alternative TCOs offer an opportunity to secure low-cost electrode materials without drastically changing the process currently used to build electrodes. Companies that successfully implement these materials in place of ITO will be insulated from the next round of ITO price shocks, which NanoMarkets believes are inevitable. Such a transition has been successfully done in the thin-film PV industry, and it has contributed to the low-cost leader status of First Solar. A brave OLED manufacturer that makes this switch early may find itself in a similar position within the OLED industry.

Thus we think that even though OLEDs have emerged using ITO instead of other materials, suppliers of zinc oxide and tin oxide should consider the OLED market as an opportunity. However, we also think that no one should expect too much from this market segment. There are few if any name brand makers of TCOs that are especially chasing after the OLED market at the present time; typically these firms are looking for larger opportunities and the business case for TCOs in the OLED environment is not compelling enough for this situation to change.

Transparent nano-material coatings in the OLED industry: While polymers and other TCOs can be expected to eat around the edge of the ITO market in the OLED industry, the real challenge to ITO is likely to come from nano-material preparations of various kinds, although this challenge will mount only slowly and nobody really knows which nanomaterials are going to take off for OLED applications at the present time. Even though better transparency and conductivity will be the initial reasons for the penetration of these nanomaterials, they will also likely eventually deliver some cost savings because, as volumes increase, nano-silver, carbon nanotube- and perhaps even graphene-based films are likely to come down dramatically in cost.

It is too early to say whether a nano-metallic or nano-carbon approach to conductive transparent nanomaterials will be used in the OLED space. We note, however, that the nano-metallic approach seems to have taken big leaps forward in recent years, while the nano-carbon approach doesn't seem to have evolved quite as fast as some of its advocates hoped.

Go back a few years and the only nano-metallic approach to transparent conductivity that was being pushed was (what became) Cambrios' ClearOhm film, an ink that consists of a suspension of silver nanowires. However, since then we have seen some very influential firms look in similar directions. Sumitomo (through its CDT subsidiary) has produced an ITO-free P-OLED Lighting device, using a fine copper mesh. And Novaled has collaborated with Saint-Gobain Recherche on ITO alternatives for large OLEDs using Saint-Gobain's Silverduct product which the two companies have claimed creates the "possibility to produce homogeneous OLED devices up to 100 cm² which will ease the manufacturing of large OLED lighting products."


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By contrast carbon nanotube preparations seem to be much trickier preparations than was expected say four years ago when a NanoMarkets analyst was told by an executive selling materials of this kind that they would have a significant penetration of the conventional display industry by now. While graphene is now being touted as the wonder material of the future, there is no guarantee that it won't prove difficult to work with once the glamor wears off. Still, we expect that nano-carbon preparations will have an eventual role to play in the OLED market, although the revenues generated will be less than those from the nano-metallic and composite sectors.

Contributors



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Last Word: In vino veritas

by Chris Williams

Chris Williams, with his wife and business partner Cathy, was co-founding Director of the highly successful UKDL network and ran the network from April 2006 to March 2009, at which time they chose to pass on the reins of the network to their colleague, Ric Allott. Chris is now developing his wide ranging interests in Plastic Electronics through the consultancy company Logystyx UK Limited that he runs with Cathy, as well as spending more time at the Ceravision company (http://www.ceravision.com) where he is a Director.

In this wintry month of November, the UK has been hit with a cold blast from the north depositing deep snow in selected areas and blasting everyone with chillingly cold temperatures down to -20 degrees C in places. From all sides I see, hear, and read comments “...It’s never been this cold this early before…I blame the Government…its due to global warming…its due to all the satellites…it would never have happened if we had never joined the EU…”

With this backdrop of misery and gloom I trekked from my warm home to Reading University last week to deliver an evening lecture to the local chapter of the IET on the subject of “Plastic Electronics – get on board or miss the revolution that’s coming your way soon!” With a mixed age group of 45 electronic engineers and computer scientists ranging from just graduated to just retired, the evening started with my heart slumping to my boots when I asked the question “How many of you have heard of Plastic Electronics?” To my utter horror not a single soul had heard the phrase, read about the technologies, or knew any company involved in it.

By the end of the evening all those present had been exposed to a rapid training exercise on Plastic Electronics, and left the room feeling more enlightened than when they entered, but they left me questioning my perspicacity. If I see articles on elements of Plastic Electronics in pretty much every technical journal I pick up, how come this random sample of 45 people had failed to do so? Repairing home, I moped around for a day or so until Cathy, my wife, business partner, and fellow electronics engineer, whose probity is beyond disputation, solved my problem. Fish pie. Cooked to her own secret recipe, this delectable dish takes a few hours to cook but really took my mind away from the problem of getting the message out to the wider masses. Particularly when supported with a generous serving of a fine Chardonnay.

I had a real Homer Simpson moment when the meal was placed at the dinner table…”Hmmm…Pie…” “Pi?” said Cathy, “you know, we really ought to update that old mnemonic about learning how to remember pi to twelve decimal places. I reckon it should now be “How I need a drink alcoholic of course after two hours of Flexible Substrate”. (Count the letters: 3.141592653589)

Well, that really did it for me. Dinner was consumed at speed, at which point I then grabbed Cathy and placed her into my Land Rover. We drove through the wild and woolly night to our local hostelry, the George and Dragon public house, which remains absolutely the best place to get an alcoholic drink for miles around.

After the first hour, the soporific effect of Abbott Ale and a roaring log fire kicked in, so I decided to test the offending question on the regulars at the bar. “Who has heard of Plastic Electronics?” Absolutely no-one. Oh dear, here we go again I thought. I passed around my home printed copy of the latest issue of Flexible Substrate. It was quite heavy, and surprisingly expensive, but mostly due to the fact that I had run out of normal laser printer copy paper so I had to use my home-produced Kevlar coated flexible ceramic paper – the stuff I normally use as under-shirt protection when I go clay pigeon shooting (some of my colleagues are getting a bit old and their eyesight and aim isn’t too good any more)…


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At least the audience was very receptive, and came up with the most enterprising ideas for initial killer applications that are quite different to anything I have seen reported in the Flexible Substrate. “Eh lad, if you can have flexible substrates with color printing on that you can change, just think on it – you can buy your electronic five pound notes at the bank and then change them at home into twenty pound notes!”

“That’s embezzlement” said our local legal know-it-all (nobody takes him seriously – he’s a gin and tonic man). The banter continued uproariously, with plenty in agreement about the benefit of electronic newspapers, particularly those with excellent sports coverage, provided they could also be rolled up and used to swat the insects that are so annoying in these rural parts of England in the later summer months.

Of course, there has to be the exception to the rule, and later in the evening it emerged. The local lounge lizard, the guy who believes all women swoon when they see him, came out with the suggestion, based on the electronic dresses he saw in Flexible Substrate, that what he would invent is the “erogenous zone T shirt” that would be mandatory for all women to wear. That way, he would prove without doubt that he was the sexiest man in the country by watching the colors change as he moved into their presence. It might have been an interesting thought if it had come from the mind of a teenager, or even a twenty to thirty year old, but from an octogenarian, it was just a step too far.

That turned the atmosphere in the pub, and since the hour was already very late, everyone decided to return to the normal topics of conversation…the vagaries of the weather…the appalling referee at last Saturday’s England versus South Africa rugby game….and the rising cost of good beer and fuel for the car. Still, for a short while, the whole community within the pub was switched on to the fascinating topic of Plastic Electronics.

And then I woke up.

http://www.electronic-displays.de


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Display Industry Calendar

A much more complete version of this calendar is located at: http://www.veritasetvisus.com/industry_calendar.htm. Please notify [email protected] to have your future events included in the listing.

December 2010

December 1-2 Printed Electronics US Santa Clara, California

December 1-3 SEMICON Japan Tokyo, Japan

December 6-8 Virtual Reality Software & Technology Hong Kong, China

December 7-8 TV 3.0: Innovations in TV and Content Delivery Los Angeles, California

December 7-9 CineAsia Hong Kong, China

December 8-10 3D Stereo Film & Technology Festival Liege, Belgium

December 15-18 SIGGRAPH Asia Seoul, Korea

January 2011

January 4-5 Storage Visions Conference Las Vegas, Nevada

January 5-7 Digital Hollywood CES Las Vegas, Nevada

January 6-9 2011 International CES Las Vegas, Nevada

January 19-20 NEPCON World Japan Tokyo, Japan

January 19-21 LED/OLED Lighting Technology Expo Tokyo, Japan

January 22-26 Tangible, Embedded, and embodied Interaction Funchal, Portugal

January 22-27 Photonics West 2011 San Francisco, California

January 23-27 Electronic Imaging 2011 San Francisco, California

January 24-27 Stereoscopic Displays and Applications San Francisco, California

January 25-27 ICE Totally Gaming London, England

January 25-29 MacWorld Expo San Francisco, California

January 26-27 DisplaySearch Japan Forum Tokyo, Japan

January 26-28 Semicon Korea Seoul, Korea

January 31 - February 3

Nanomaterials, Nanofabrication, and Organic Electronics Adelaide, Australia


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February 2011

February 1-3 Integrated Systems Europe Amsterdam, Holland

February 4 Organic Displays, Lighting, & Electronics Los Angeles, California

February 6-11 European Conference on Liquid Crystals Maribor, Slovenia

February 7-10 Flexible Electronics and Displays Conference Phoenix, Arizona

February 12-17 Medical Imaging Orlando, Florida

February 13-16 Intelligent User Interfaces Palo Alto, California

February 15-17 Broadcast Video Expo London, England

February 15-18 Hollywood Post Alliance 2011 Tech Retreat Rancho Mirage, California

February 18-20 Symposium on Interactive 3D Graphics and Games San Francisco, California

February 22-25 Digital Signage Expo Las Vegas, Nevada

February 25-27 Sound & Vision 2011 Bristol, England February 28 -

March 4 Game Developers Conference San Francisco, California

March 2011

March 1-2 US FPD Conference San Diego, California

March 1-4 LED China 2011 Guangzhou, China

March 1-5 CeBIT 2011 Hanover, Germany

March 2-3 Electronic Displays Conference 2011 Nuremberg, Germany

March 2-4 PV Expo 2011 Tokyo, Japan

March 3 Createasphere/Entertainment Technology Exposition Universal City, California

March 3-4 International Thin-Film Transistor Conference 2011 Cambridge, England

March 5-7 International Conference on Imaging Theory and Applications Algarve, Portugal

March 6-9 Focus on Imaging Birmingham, England

March 8-10 Air Traffic Control Amsterdam, Holland

March 14-18 2011 Measurement Science Conference Pasadena, California

March 15-17 FPD China Shanghai, China

March 15-17 Laser World of Photonics China Shanghai, China


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March 17-19 EHX Spring Orlando, Florida

March 19-20 Symposium on 3D User Interfaces Singapore

March 19-23 Virtual Reality 2011 Singapore

March 22-24 Phosphors Summit San Antonio, Texas

March 22-24 Image Sensors Europe London, England

March 23 Korea FPD Conference Seoul, Korea

March 28-31 Cinemacon Las Vegas, Nevada

April 2011

April 4-6 Smart Fabrics 2011 London, England

April 4-8 MIPTV Cannes, France

April 5-6 Printed Electronics Europe Dusseldorf, Germany

April 5-6 Photovoltaics Europe Dusseldorf, Germany

April 5-7 Photovoltaic Technology Show Stuttgart, Germany

April 8-9 2011 Taiwan FPD Conference Taipei, Taiwan

April 9-14 NAB 2011 Las Vegas, Nevada

April 12-14 Sign UK/Digital Signage Showcase Birmingham, England

April 13-14 International Eye Tracking Conference Reno, Nevada

April 13-15 FineTech Japan & Display 2011 Tokyo, Japan

April 13-15 Touch Panel Japan Tokyo, Japan

April 22 DisplaySearch Japan Forum Tokyo, Japan

April 25-26 Interactive Displays 2011 Sacramento, California

April 27-28 Digital Signage Show 2011 San Francisco, California

April 27-28 3D Gaming Summit Universal City, California

April 28-30 International Sign Expo Las Vegas, Nevada

Documents

VVFS-55 November 2010 - Veritas et Visus · Veritas et Visus November 2010 Vol 6 No 5. Veritas et Visus ... Haruna; K-Solar 3G Technologies; Pidilite Innovation Centre; PJI Contract;