Monthly Archives: February 2014

Electronic Display Conference (eDC 2014) in Germany

February 27, 2014

I’m traveling in the beautiful Nuremburg, Germany for electronic Display Conference (eDC) 2014. Even though it’s raining today, the conference still had over 260 attendees.

In the touch session in the morning, Dr. Roland Aubauer from Microchip Technology discussed 3D gesture touch controller they developed. Mr. Bob Raikes, from Meko (also my industry friend) gave a presentation titled “Just because touch works on a phone, it’s not always the answer”. He jokingly suggested the PC should add a foot pedal, so like driving a car, we can use our foot to do left click or right click. Even that is a joke, but he does have a good point: besides finger touch, there are many other methods to do machine-human user interface.

Figure: Mr. Bob Raikes gave presentation

Bob speak

Photo by: Jennifer Colegrove

At the keynote session, Dr. Jyrki Kimmel from Nokia could not come in person, so he gave the keynote about displays in the mobile ecosystem on the telephone, while the conference chairman Professor Doctor Blankenbach helped to click through the slides.  It went well.

Then on behalf of Touch Display Research, I gave a keynote on the touch screen and emerging display market. I first thanked the conference organizer and our sponsor company Data Modul. I then discussed 7 new opportunities in the touch and display market: phablet, NB and AIO PC with touch, ITO-replacement, flexible and curved display, active pen, touchless control, and quantum dot.

Figure: Touch Display Research Dr. Jennifer Colegrove gave presentation

Jenny speaking edc small3

Photo by: Dr. Susanne Bieller, VDMA-DFF

At the end, Mrs. Sweta Dash from IHS gave a keynote about top 10 display trends for 2014 and beyond.

The conference ended at around 4:20pm very successfully. Attendees were still lingering around for networking.

Thanks for reading,

Jennifer and team

Samsung Gear Fit with curved displays at MWC 2014

February 25, 2014

At Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2014, Samsung announced its newest wearable device: Gear Fit. It has a 1.84” super AMOLED display, with 432X128 pixel format. (Please note, some website said it is 1.4”, which is wrong).

Figure: Samsung Gear Fit with curved display

gear fit

Source: Samsung, 2014

Samsung claims the Gear Fit is “the industry’s first curved, super AMOLED wearable device”. I think that is correct. Although there are a dozen smart watches entered the market recently, but most of them are using flat, rigid display. As Touch Display Research reported 4 months ago, we believe flexible and curved displays are more ergonomic for the wrist, and larger-sized flexible displays could fit better and show more information. The Gear Fit is what a smart watch should look like. We forecast 2 inch or larger curved display will be adopted in smart watch as well.

In the “Flexible and curved display technologies and market forecast” report, Touch Display Research forecasts 30 million units flexible and curved displays will be shipped for smart watch application by 2023.

Thanks for reading,

Jennifer and team

YotaPhone with two displays at MWC 2014

February 24, 2014

Today at Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2014, YotaPhone and Cypress announced features on the 2nd generation YotaPhone: larger and better displays and both displays will have full touch screen.

Here is the spec comparison of the first and second generation YotaPhone:

Yota 1st and 2nd spec comp

Source: Yota Devices, compiled by Touch Display Research, Feb 2014

YotaPhone stands out from the crowd with its low power secondary display on the back, which is made by E Ink.

Touch Display Research believes flexible, thin, low power, good sunlight readability display will be suitable for secondary, cover display. For example, in a bright sunny day, when it’s hard to see the information on your mobile phone’s LCD or AMOLED display, you can use your secondary display to show the mobile phone information. In the “Flexible and Curved Display Technologies and Market Forecast” report, Touch Display Research forecast secondary display will have rapid growth from 2014.

Thanks for reading,

Jennifer and team

Fitbit wristband lover

February 15, 2014

This morning, I was reading Wall Street Journal and laughing. I must share with my readers.

Today’s Wall Street Journal reported that Fitbit’s new wristband–Force band causes skin rashes after user wears it for several days or weeks. A user “loved his Fitbit Force so much that when red bumps began to appear on his wrist in early February, he moved it to his other wrist. Four days later, he had rashes on both wrists, he said.”

Sometimes, we love someone or something so much, we can put up with it. The Force’s display is only 0.7 inch, the smallest among the recent released smart wearable devices. We recommend Fitbit to use a bigger and curved display on the next generation wristband. Touch Display Research forecasts 30 million units flexible and curved displays will be shipped for smart watch application by 2023.

Thanks for reading,

Jennifer and team

Apple on quantum dot display and lighting

February 13, 2014

Apple just filed several patent applications on quantum dot display and lighting recently, according to US Patent and Trademark office.

One patent application is about better display uniformity can be achieved with quantum dot diffuser and prism sheet. One patent application is using quantum dot with MEMS shutter module.

Touch Display Research surveyed many quantum dot suppliers and found that the quantum dot display component market already surpassed $70 million in 2013.   We forecast that the quantum dot display and lighting component market will reach $9.6 billion by 2023.

Besides Apple, other major brands’ attitude to quantum dot was also analyzed in chapter 6 in the Quantum dot display and lighting technologies and market forecast report. Bill of material (BOM) analysis of quantum dot TV and tablet PC are in chapter 7 in the report.

Thanks for reading,

Jennifer and team

Microsoft Surface VP Panos Panay speak about people

February 12, 2014

I was invited to attend Microsoft’s Hardware event recently hosted in their Mountain View, California campus. There were about 100 attendees at this event.

Microsoft Vice President for Surface, Panos Panay gave a very good speech at this event. He indicated “It’s not about hardware, it’s not about software, it’s about people. It’s not only about vision; it’s about people that can deliver the vision.”

After his speech, I asked him about the Microsoft Surface table and tablet. More analysis can be found in Touch and Emerging Display monthly report, February 2014 issue.

Thanks for reading,

Jennifer and team

Plastic Logic and Novaled OTFT backplane AMOLED

February 10, 2014

I just came back from the 2014 FLEX conference and the SID LA Symposium. There are many highlights in these 2 conferences. One of the exciting news is about the Organic TFT (OTFT) backplane AMOLED.

On Feb 6th, 2014, Plastic Logic’s director of research and partnerships, Mr. Mike Banach gave a presentation titled “A New Frontier for Flexible Displays”. At the same day, both Plastic Logic and Novaled announced their partnership and their demo of OTFT backplane AMOLED.

Their demo is a monochrome flexible AMOLED, targeting for wearable applications. Plastic Logic’s CEO, Indro Mukerjee, said, “2014 will be the year that wearable technology starts to go mainstream.”

Touch Display Research analyst agrees with that. Touch Display Research forecasts 30 million units flexible and curved displays will be shipped for smart watch application by 2023. Overall flexible and curved display market will reach $27 Billion by 2023.

Figure: Flexible and curved displays for smart watch application forecast to 2023

flexible curved smart watch

Source: Touch Display Research. “Flexible and Curved Display and Lighting Technologies and Market Forecast” report. September, 2013.

It is said Merck’s organic semiconductor material was used in the OTFT prototype.

As we covered in our “Flexible and Curved Display and Lighting Technologies and Market Forecast” report, Sony has demonstrated OTFT backplane AMOLED before.

Thanks for reading,

Jennifer and team