Samsung flexible AMOLED displays

Samsung delaying production of flexible AMOLED displays

         

While Samsung hoped to begin production of its new flexible AMOLED displays in 2012, it looks like a wrench has been thrown into the gears, causing the company to delay production.

Samsung is experiencing troubles with low yields in the LITI process that the company is using to produce red and green pixels for the new displays. Blue pixels aren’t affected, as they are created using an FMM process instead.

Samsung hopes to overcome these technical issues soon enough to still be able to produce a smartphone using the new flexible display in in the first half of 2013. Whether or not this will actually happen remains to be seen.

While Samsung is having issues with mass producing the new displays, we do know that it is possible to make them. So far Samsung has produced a number of “pilot” displays, and has shown them off, the first time being at CES in 2011

         

The first phones using the new screen technology will likely still be made using rigid glass, so the phones won’t actually be flexible. These new flexible displays are still thinner than existing AMOLED displays. That, along with the fact that they can be curved, means more room for other components, leading to thinner phones.
Samsung isn’t the only company planning to introduce flexible displays. LG is also working on flexible displays, using the same  technology as the Samsung displays. LG has said that they plan to introduce these displays in the second half of 2013.
Hopefully, the production issues will be overcome quickly and we’ll these Samsung flexible displays on the market as early as the company hopes. Samsung initially hoped to begin mass-producing the displays in 2009, so this wouldn’t be the first time the company fell short of its goals.