Kent Displays’ successful story

May 16, 2014
I’m traveling in northern Ohio this week to speak at the FlexTech Alliance workshop. It’s good to be back in Ohio, since I got my Ph.D. from Kent State University in Ohio 14 years ago. Ohio is like my second home.
Kent Displays invited me to visit them during this trip. Right when I entered Kent Displays’ company lobby, there is a digital signage in the lobby, showing the message, “Welcome, Jennifer Colegrove, Enjoy your day.” I felt very special and took a picture of it. See figure here.

Figure. Kent Displays digital signage
Kent Display welcome Jennifer
Source: Kent Displays Inc. Photo by Jennifer Colegrove

The digital signage is using Kent Displays’ bi-stable LCD, which is called “zero power” display. The display doesn’t consume any power when showing a static image; only consume power when you change the image. It is operated with battery; no power plug needed.
I had a meeting with my old industry friends: Dr. Green, CEO of Kent Displays, and Dr. Khan, CTO of Kent Displays, and Mr. Oswald, communication director of Kent Displays. I also had a tour of their factory and discovered their success story of the Boogie Board.
Kent Displays make the Boogie Board from the flexible display to the final shipping box of the Boogie Board. In another words, they do the whole supply chain. Dr. Khan said, “In some sense, we are doing more than Apple.” That is a good comparison and its true. Apple doesn’t make the displays; rather they purchase the displays from LG, Samsung, Sharp, AUO, Japan Display, etc.
More analysis will be in our “Touch and Emerging Display” May 2014 report. You can subscribe to the report right now on this website.
Thanks for reading,
Jennifer and team