Monthly Archives: October 2017

SEMI FLEX 2017 Conference is very successful

October 31, 2017

I just returned from the SEMI FLEX Southeast Asia 2017 Conference, at the beautiful Singapore. It’s a very successful conference with presentations and exhibitions of flexible electronics. This is my second time to speak at this conference. It’s my honor to meet some of you in person.

Figure 1. SEMI FLEX 2017 conference

Photo by: Touch Display Research Inc.

The president of SEMI Southeast Asia, Mr. NG Kai Fai gave a welcome speech at the opening ceremony.

Figure: SEMI Southeast Asia’s president, Mr. NG Kai Fai gave welcome speech

Photo by: Dr. Jennifer Colegrove, Touch Display Research.

On behalf of Touch Display Research, I gave a presentation on flexible display, flexible lighting and flexible touch: technologies and market forecast, and discussed the touch screen and display for Apple iPhone X.

More analysis and review of the SEMI FLEX Southeast Asia 2017 Conference can be found in the “Touch and Emerging Display” monthly report.

Thanks for reading,

Dr. Jennifer Colegrove and team

HP ZBook X2 and active pen market

October 18, 2017.  By Jennifer Colegrove Ph.D.

Today, HP just announced the new ZBook X2 detachable PC with a Wacom’s active pen with 4096 pressure sensitive levels. The active pen has natural tilt and almost zero latency.

Figure: HP ZBook x2 with Wacom pen

Source: HP

HP is the earlier adopter of active pen. Its TouchSmart 12.1” NB PCs has adopted N-trig’s DuoSense active pen technology around 2009. HP is the company which has tried many types of active pens in the past 8 years.

Fourteen major brands’ adoption of active pen is analyzed in the Active pen 2017 report.

About 4 months ago, Apple just announced two new iPad Pro: the 10.5 inch version and the 12.9 inch version with active pens.

The active pen industry landscape has changed dramatically in the recent 3 years: Companies actively working on active pens has increased from 60 companies in 2014 to over 120 companies in 2017. These over 120 companies’ profiles are in the excel database. The strengths and weaknesses of key players are analyzed in this report.

The Active Pen 2017 Report provides the detail pen technologies analysis of 21 types of pen: 13 active pen and 8 passive pens.

There is no perfect active pen yet in the market. The 10 key characters of an ideal active pen are analyzed in chapter 8. This report provides not only the outlook for active pen and penetration in touch devices, but also provide Bill of Material (BOM) analysis of active pen module for “pen only” and “pen and finger” touch in chapter 7.

Over 100 devices with active pen are compared side by side with pen technologies and pen suppliers in the excel database.

Touch Display Research forecasted the active pen market will grow rapidly in the next several years.

Thanks for reading,

Dr. Jennifer Colegrove and team

SID Vehicle Display 2017 Conference had record high attendees

October 3, 2017.  By Jennifer Colegrove Ph.D.

I just returned from the SID Vehicle Display and Interface 2017 conference in Detroit, Michigan. It was my honor to meet some of you in person.

This year’s conference had record high attendees—approximately 500 industry professionals. I recall when I spoke at this conference about 10 years ago regarding touch screen, there were approximately 100 attendees. This growth is another reflection of the automotive industry’s adoption of advanced technologies.

Dr. Thomas Seder, GM Technical Fellow & Chief Technologist-HMI at General Motors, gave a Keynote speech titled “Augmented Reality System Architecture, Supporting Technologies and HMI Requirements” on September 26th.

Figure: Dr. Thomas Seder gave speech

Photo by: Dr. Jennifer Colegrove, Touch Display Research.

On behalf of Touch Display Research, I gave a presentation on Automotive Market’s New Opportunities for Touch Screen, Touchless Control, Flexible Displays and Smart Windows.

Figure: Dr. Jennifer Colegrove’s presentation

More analysis and review of SID Vehicle Display 2017 Conference can be found in the “Touch and Emerging Display” monthly report.

Thanks for reading,

Dr. Jennifer Colegrove and team