WHAT MANUFACTURERS WILL OFFER OLED TVS?
By: Jack Burden
Winter, 2008
Sony certainly leads the way in the race for the newest best television technology perhaps ever produced – OLED TV. OLED stands for Organic Light-Emitting Diode and is now being produced by Sony in an 11” model – the Sony XEL-1 television. Sony has hedged their bets on this technology by partnering with powerhouse Toyota to produce them.
Samsung OLED TVs are likely to follow soon after. Samsung has already produced both 40” and 17” prototype OLED TVs displayed at the International Meeting on Information Display in Soul. Samsung OLED prototypes differ from the Sony OLED in that they are based on white emission with an RGB color filter rather than an OLED, which has a patterned RGB light output. They call them AMOLED (Active Matrix OLED) displays. Samsung’s Park Jong-woo has stated that he believes OLED could be a big breakthrough in the TV and public display business.
LG Electronics, another Korean manufacturer has also invested in the OLED TV technology as has Philips Electronics.
Seiko Epson Corp. has also produced an OLED TV screen of 20”, and Panasonic parent Matsushita has manufactured a 21” OLED TV display screen which the company is testing for use in televisions.
It seems that the major manufacturers with clout are voting with their yen. The best heeled of them do not want to be left out of this potential boom technology.
