Tianma

Tianma has demonstrated a 108-inch 4K tiled microLED display, that it says was produced with an all-laser mass transfer process - which probably means it utilizes both a LIFT and an LLO process. The company also says that this display features zero visible bezels, ultra-high brightness (it did not specify it, though), and exceptional contrast.

This is the first time that Tianma is showing a large-area tiled microLED. It has showed single modules before for example the 5.04" 480x320 (222 micron LEDs) it has shown in 2021. In 2024, it has demonstrated a 7.5-inch module that features a brightness of 600 nits.  

Tianma says it has made a significant breakthrough in its transparent microLED display technology, and the company demonstrated several transparent microLED displays at a tradeshow in China with sizes up to 9" and with adjustable transparency. 

Unfortunately we do not have any more details about these new prototypes, but it is understood that Tianma is targeting the automotive market for these new displays.

In June 2022, Tianma Microelectronics announced plans to establish a $164 million full-process microLED pilot line, in Xiamen. Later in 2024 Tianma said that the production line has commenced trial production.

Now Tianma updates that its production line has started to produce standard display panels, in small batches. This is an important step for the company. Tianma says that its first standard product is a 7-inch automotive display. It will be interesting to see whether Tianma can find customers for these low-volume batch production runs.

In Displayweek 2024, Tianma demonstrates several microLED prototypes, including a 7.6" 167 PPI (1204x398) 5,000 nits microLED display based HUD. The display was first developed in 2023.

Tianma now announced that it has developed a second generation HUD display, that achieves double the brightness (10,000 nits). The company refers to this display as the 8 MicroLED IRIS HUD display. Tianma also said that the new display offers a "refined and compact design that provides greater flexibility for automotive interior integration", and it also boasts "significantly enhanced image quality, featuring more vibrant colors and richer details".

Tianma Microelectronics announced that it has developed a new side wiring technology that enables completely seamless tiled microLED displays. The new technology is based on a new process that is much more cost effective compared to other processes, in fact Tianma says it can reduce the cost of side wiring deposition by up to three times.

Tianma shared some details about its first tiled microLED displays. These offer a very small pixel pitch of 0.4 mm, and are based on an LTPS backplane. Tianma also revealed that it is using a laser-based transfer process. The company is now running trial production, and it hopes to improve the yields and production efficiency in 2025, and then move to small batch mass production.

The microLED display technology is highly promising, as these displays offer increased brightness, efficiency and lifetime over the current LCD and OLED displays. However adoption of microLED displays in the major display markets is still years away. One display segment that could see adoption of microLED display sooner, is the transparent display sector.

Transparent displays are very interesting and have been researched for many years - and we have seen commercial adoption of transparent LCD, LED and OLED displays. These never achieved meaningful market success, but microLED developers hope that once microLED transparent displays are available this could change, thanks to the higher transparency and brightness offered by microLEDs compared to OLEDs and LCDs.

In recent years, we have seen many companies demonstrating transparent microLED prototypes, and even deploying some solution commercially. We will detail some of these recent advances below.

In June 2022, Tianma Microelectronics announced plans to establish a 1.1 billion Yuan ($164 million USD) full-process microLED pilot line, in Xiamen. A few days ago, Tianma announced that its production line has commenced trial production. The new production line is co-located with a 8.6-Gen LCD fan at the Tongxiang High-Tech New Town in Xiamen.

Tianma also detailed the first microLED display is produced at the new plant, a 7.5" module aimed towards tiled displays, that offers a brightness of 600 nits and a low 5% reflectance. This is the first time we hear of a tiled microLED display from Tianma, and hopefully Tianma will soon show a large-area TV based on these modules.

Tianma shows several MicroLEDs prototypes at Displayweek 2024, including automotive displays, transparent displays, and wearable ones.

The first display was an automotive, a transparent 8.07-inch octagon-shaped display aimed towards digital side mirror applications (to be placed inside the vehicle). The display offers a transparency of 55%, a resolution of 608x1204 (167 PPI) and a brightness of 1,500 nits.

A few days ago, Apple decided to cancel its microLED project with ams-Osram, a development that took the display industry by surprise (or at least parts of the industry). MicroLED developers are now looking to understand how Apple's decision will shape the industry, and a couple of days ago two China-based developers, Tianma Microelectronics and Konka, said that they are continuing their own microLED developments projects, as the companies are still optimistic about the future of microLEDs.

Konka has vertically integrated its supply chain and is producing its own microLED chips using Aixtron's MOCVD systems. Back in 2019, Konka announced it is building a $365 million micro-LED R&D center in Chongqing, as the company believes that Micro-LED will become the leading technology for ultra-high quality consumer TVs. Earlier that year, Konka launched tiled large micro-LED displays called APHAEA brand. Konka demonstrated several possible configurations - including 118" 4K and 236" 8K. The price of a 118" 4K display was around $240,000 while the 236" 8K TV had a price tag of $1.25 million. Click here for more information on Konka's APHAEA micro-LED TVs. 

During the company's latest innovation conference, Tianma unveiled that it developed a small 1.63" 403 PPI microLED display, that targets wearables and small mobile terminals.

The company did not disclose more information on this new display, and did not say how close it is to commercialize it.