March 2019

UK-based GaN-on-Si MicroLED developer Plessey Semiconductor developed its proprietary 2D planar gallium nitride on silicon (GaN-on-Si) process to emit Green light without the need for color conversion techniques.

Plessey says that its native Green LEDs are formed inherently using its proprietary GaN-on-Si epitaxial growth process similar to the native Blue LEDs with the principal difference coming in the amount of indium that is incorporated in the quantum well structures of the LED. The native Green emission is orders of magnitude times brighter than color-converted process for micro-LEDs.

Researchers from the US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) developed new GaN nanowire-based ultraviolet LEDs that are five times as bright as regular LEDs. The new design uses a silicon-doped GaN nanowire core coated with a shell made from magnesium-doped GaN and Aluminum.

The nanowires are built in a p-i-n structure and the researcher say that adding the Aluminum to the shell of the LED helps confine electrons to the nanowire core by introducing an asymmetry in the electrical current which boost the electroluminescence of the device.

In July 2018, France-based 3D GaN LED developer Aledia announced that it has selected Veeco Instruments’s Propel GaN MOCVD system to support its advanced R&D. Veeco's Propel system enables Aledia to process 6- and 8-inch wafers or 2- to 4-inch wafers in a minibatch mode. Aledia also uses Veeco's R&D K465i MOCVD system.

Aledia and Veeco now announced that Aledia "expands its portfolio of Veeco equipment to develop and produce 3D micro-LEDs". It is not clear what kind of equipment Aledia ordered - and it also seems that the two companies are collaborating to develop next-generation Micro-LED production equipment.

n-tech Research says that the Micro-LED lighting will experience very fast growth, with revenues exceeding $1.4 billion by 2028 with 170 million lighting units shipped.

n-tech says that some industry analysts say that micro-LED lighting will always remain a tiny niche and only cater for novelty lighting. n-tech, however, sees several advantages of micro-LEDs compared to conventional HB LEDs and expect that these will be enough to earn micro-LEDs a healthy share of the LED lighting market.

We are happy to announce the eighth edition of The OLED Handbook, the most comprehensive resource on OLED technology, industry and market - now updated for 2019. The OLED industry grows and changes very fast, and the new edition include new details on the OLED mobile display market, new production fabs in China, OLED TVs, flexible OLEDs and more.

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• A history of OLED development
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• A list of existing and planned AMOLED fabs
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Researchers from the Rochester Institute of Technology managed to vertically integrate nanowire gallium nitride (GaN) field-effect transistors (FETs) and indium gallium nitride (InGaN) LEDs. Such technology could be useful for future Micro-LED displays.

The researchers say that this integration could provide to enable smaller structures and more cost-effective processes compared to alternative light emitting architectures - such as high-electron-mobility transistor (HEMT) combined with LEDs.