January 2018

Korea-based LED developer Lumens is developing a Micro-LED based HUD for the automotive aftermarket, and at CES the company demonstrated two prototypes, a Direct-HUD and a project-based one.

Lumen's HUDs use three monochrome (RGB) Micro-LED panels, which combined can reach 100,000 nits. The project one uses a projection lens for the image magnification. The smaller HUD uses the Micro-LED directly as the output to the combiner.

Researchers from Korea's Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST) and Sungkyunkwan University contact lenses that has an ultra-sensitive blood glucose sensor that analyze tears.

To the wearer, the contact lens appear like regular ones, but when the sensor detects fluctuations in the blood glucose level, it lights up the chipset and an embedded micro-LED that stays lit if the blood glucose level is normal, so the wearer understand his blood levels. The contact lens are powered by wirelessly transmitted electricity.

UK-based optical thin-film developer Artemis announced a partnership with Plessey Semiconductor to co-develop HUD displays that use Plessey's GaN-on-Si MicroLEDs and Artemis' thin-film coatings for HUDs.

Plessey recently announced its new licensing platform and also its intentions to bring a monolithic MicroLED display to the market in H1 2018. Plessey demonstrated an HUD prototype powered by its MicroLED display.

Taiwan's Jasper Display Corp (JDC) unveiled its new silicon micro-LED backplane, the eSP70, which reportedly features high brightness and contrast possible. JDC's eSP70 is capable of FHD (1920x1080) resolution using a pixel pitch of 8 um and JDC says that it offers excellent current uniformity via a proprietary current source pixel (uniformity is better than 1% across the array).

JDC demonstrated the eSP70 using micro-LEDs provided by glō. The company says that this is the industry's first specialized micro-LED ready silicon. JDC's technology can be customized and it can be suitable for a wide range of applications, from AR headsets to automotive headlights. JDC's eSP70's 8" are now shipping.

Researchers from Fudan University, Shanghai develop a high-bandwidth white-light based system made from a blue gallium nitride (GaN) micro-LED with a yellow-emitting perovskite quantum dots. This system could be a way to enable high-speed real-time visible light communication (VLC).

The researchers used a 80 x 80 um blue-emitting micro-LED that has a modulation bandwidth of about 160 MHz and a peak emission wavelength of ~445 nm. The white-light system (following the perovskite QD conversion) achieves 85 Mhz - which means a maximum data rate of 300 Mbps.

Digitimes Research says that China-based smartphone makers (including Huawei, Oppo and Xiaomi) are planning to adopt mini LED backlit LCD panels in future smartphones as an alternative for AMOLED displays.

The Chinese phone makers have reached out to Taiwan-based LED makers to start making mini-LED backlighting units by June 2018. Currently the OLED market is in an over-demand situation which means that securing enough AMOLED capacity is not easy - and it also drives prices up. According to IHS, the situation will reverse in 2018, though.

Earlier this week Samsung unveiled its MicroLED TV, called The Wall. This is a modular display that is completely seamless. At CES Samsung unveiled a 146" 4K display, butt the company will offer it in customized sizes.

Samsung says that this is the world's first Modular TV. While modular displays are not new (Mitsubishi for example has a beautiful modular PMOLED display called Diamond Vision OLED) it seems that Samsung aims for this to be the world's first modular consumer display. It's not clear whether customers will be able to change the design.

Following Samsung's unveiling of its 146" Micro-LED TV prototype, LG Display's CEO said that LGD is also developing Micro-LED technologies for large >150" panels.

LG Display sees several technical challenges ahead before it could launch such a display commercially - and it also has concerns regarding the production costs of huge MicroLED TVs. In the meantime the company is focused on its OLED TV technologies.

Taiwan's Innolux demonstrated a new prototype mini-LED display. The 10.1" panel features a resolution of 1540x720 (168 PPI) and it seems to be a monochrome white display. Innolux hopes to commercialize such displays by 2020.

Innolux says that this type is very suitable for automotive applications - as it has an almost infinite contrast (similar to OLED displays) and it can also work in the demanding temperatures required by the automotive industry. Innolux hopes that such mini-LED displays can find a market and be a bridge before the company can develop micro-LED displays with higher densities and increased brightness.

As reported a couple of months ago, Samsung unveiled its first Micro-LED TV, aptly named "The Wall". This is a 146-inch tiled 4K display that is almost 8 times larger than a 55" TV in area.

Samsung did not reveal much details. Reports from CES suggest that each tile is about 3-inch in size, and it seems like you cannot see the seams of the individual tiles. It did demonstrate the difference in size between Micro-LED and regular LEDs as you can see below: