On October 25th the MicroLED Industry Association will host a webinar on microLED technologies with the University of California, Santa Barbara. UCSB has a world-leading LED research program, led by Mitsubishi Distinguished Professor Steven DerBaars and Nobel Prize in Physics laureate Professor Shuji Nakamura, professor of materials and of electrical and computer engineering.

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During the webinar, Prof. Nakamura and Prof. DenBaars will both give a lecture to update on the latest microLED research done at UCSB, and a few members of the MicroLED Association will also give a lecture to introduce their company technologies. There will also be time for questions, and an open discussion.

India-based startup Focally unveils prototype AR glasses that feature several innovative technologies, including a full-color microLED based display engine.

Focally says that its Universe AR glasses will enable full-color and monochrome display modes, which leads us to believe that this display engine is built from 3 separate monochrome microLED displays, perhaps a similar design to Vuzix's display engine. Using waveguide optics, the company says that the display provides a 30-degree FOV. The company says that the display engine is the world's smallest and brightest, but does not provide any technical details.

In 2021, Austria-based C SEED released a high-end microLED TV, the $400,000 165" 4K C SEED M1, which has a unique foldable design, which makes use of seven large MicroLED panels.

C SEED now announced a new outdoor foldable MicroLED TV, called the HLR series. The displays (both based on seven panesl) offer a brightness of 4,000 nits and a resolution of 4K. There are two models, a 144" one which costs $298,000 and a 201" one that costs $590,000.

Digitimes reports that PlayNitride is starting to sample microLED panels for 5 or 6 potential automotive customers. The customers are interested in flexible and transparent panels, and they have engaged PlayNitride in custom R&D projects to develop the required displays.

PlayNitride's CEO, Charles Li, noted that the company expects its customers to launch several concept car models in early 2024, equipped with the new microLED displays.

Today we published a new edition of our MicroLED Transfer Process Market Report, with all the latest information. The new edition includes news from related companies, new in-depth details on two transfer processes and more.

Reading this report, you'll learn all about:

• All known microLED transfer processes
• The current industry and market status
• Advantages and disadvantages of transfer technologies
• Future technologies and roadmaps

The report package also provides:

• An introduction to microLED production processes
• Over 20 presentations, brochures and technical papers
• MicroLED chip-level market estimates and forecasts
• Free updates for a year

This microLED display transfer process report provides a comprehensive look into current and future LED transfer technologies processes used for the production of microLED displays. The report covers everything you need to know about the current status of the industry.

This is an article by TechBlick, organizers of the upcoming MicroLED Displays virtual event. MicroLED-Info readers get a 100 Euro discount.

In this article, using select technology slides, we highlight several interesting advancements in MicroLED and/or QD displays. More specifically, we cover 3600PPI “Silicon” Displays | Gravure printed microbumps | Electrohydrodynamically printed QD color converters | Laser LLO and Transfer for MicroLEDs | QD vs Phosphors | Energy saving credentials of microLED

“Silicon” Displays with an incredible 3600ppi full color using microLED and QD technology?

Sharp (HIRANO Yasuakie et al) has developed this technology.

As shown in the slide below, first blue-only uLEDs are formed on a sapphire substrate. Here, one LED array contains 352 x 198 micro LED dies of 24 um x 8 um in size. In parallel, an LSI chip containing the driving circuitry is formed on a silicon wafer. Here, the cathode (N-type electrode) and anode (P-type electrode) are fabricated for each micro LED die to apply driving voltage independently to each die. The Au bump electrodes are fabricated in accordance with the pitch of the LED dies. The two substrates are flip-chip bonded using Au-Au bonding. Here one can already see the parallel to the silicon and optoelectronic industry (vs. the traditional thin film display industry!). Next, the sapphire layer is removed via laser lift off. Finally, Cd-free quantum dots (green and red) are deposited atop the microLED dies to enable R G color conversion. This way one achieves RGB colors

The device architecture is shown in slide 2- here one can see the location of GaN uLED dies, Au bumps, as well as light shielding walls and quantum dots (QDs). This way, a full color 1,053 ppi display is formed.

However, given the small size of the emissive area of uLEDs, the brightness is low. An innovative solution here is to switch from individual driving cathode electrodes to a common one, thus freeing up more spaces for uLEDs. As shown in slide three, the light emission in one pixel was improved from 23% to 38%. As a result, brightness of 11 knits was achieved. This is an excellent progress. Of course, it is not the final game as even at 11 knits the brightness is not yet not sufficient for outdoor AR applications.

Join us and your industry peers on 30 NOV – 1 DEC 2022 at our first-ever specialist microLED and QD event to hear more about this technology from Yasuakie-san et al.

Today we're starting a new series, of interviews with MicroLED Industry Association members. The first company we interview is Radiant Vision Systems, and we have Shaina Warner, Radiant''s Marketing Program Manager.

Q: Can you introduce your company and technology?

Radiant develops and manufactures test & measurement solutions that are used to evaluate the visual quality of displays, backlit components, LEDs, other light sources. Using photometric and colorimetric imagers calibrated to a model of human visual perception, Radiant offers the most sophisticated inspection technology for ensuring light-emitting products meet customer expectations for quality and performance.

Leaders in consumer electronics, virtual & augmented reality, automotive, aerospace manufacturing, and beyond rely on Radiant to ensure accuracy, automate quality control, reduce costs, and improve efficiency. We have over 30 years of proven production experience with thousands of cameras testing millions of lights and displays worldwide. We’re also happy to be a global organization, offering direct local access to products and support that help equip our customers for success.

Q: Can you say why you joined the microLED association and what it is you hope to achieve?

Luxury display maker Danvas announced its premier Series G display, for digital art collectors. The company says that the microLED display will "accelerate the world’s appreciation of digital artists and their work by validating artwork ownership through a signature NFT authentication indicator and by allowing a buyer’s entire collection to be displayed in a truly exceptional next-generation display".

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The Series G, designed by the Ammunition Group, is based on a microLED display that can be deployed in a square (4x4 feet) or portrait or landscape formats (3x4 feet). We do now have any more information on the display, and if it is indeed a microLED display, which if so it is likely to be tiled.

The COVID-19 pandemic created an increased demand for high quality IT solutions, including monitors and collaborative tools, which prompted LCD and OLED display makers to develop new solutions for this market for applications like computer monitors, signage and more.

microLED displays (and also OLED displays) that are 20-inch or more will suffer from incompatibility with standard capacitive touch, because the thin microLED display panels result in large parasitic capacitive coupling with the touch surface. The dynamic driving of microLED (where only lit pixels draw current) further reduces the capacitive touch performance by introducing unpredictable “display pattern noise”. These issues are easily mitigated in small area displays, but as displays increase in size, the performance and costs of capacitive solutions suffer.

Techblick's "Mini- & Micro-LED Displays: Markets, Manufacturing Innovations, Applications, Promising Start-ups". This virtual event, the first one to be focused on microLED displays will take place from November 30 to December 1, 2022 (it is co-located with a QuantumDots event). The organizers offer a special early-bird discount, that ends on September 14.

MicroLED-Info readers get a special discount for this event, see more here.