A report from Korea IT News site ET News this week said that Samsung Electronics is working on a technology that will apply quantum dot technology, currently used in its higher-end SUHD LED TVs, to an OLED-like technology, called QLED.
According to the story, Samsung is working on a “medium to long-term roadmap for next-generation TVs” that calls for Samsung moving beyond OLED display technology directly to the newer QLED approach. The technology will use self-emissive panels, like OLED displays, but will remove organic substances that can lead to premature aging and other issues.
The new technology will also utilize quantum dot technology that boosts brightness and color reproduction instead of color filters.
Samsung has targeted a two- to three-year process to bring the new QLED technology up to a level where it can be mass produced for the commercial market. It is expected that new QLED TVs will come out in 2019. In the interim, Samsung will continue to emphasize quantum-dot LED TV technologies used in its current SUHD TV models.
Read more on the Samsung QLED strategy after the jump:
The ET News story said that Samsung has elected to pass on OLED technology due to its issues with premature aging of certain colors, burn-in risks and high manufacturing unit cost.
LG Electronics, which is currently advancing the market for OLED TVs around the world, says it has addressed some of the issues Samsung has listed arising from its earlier RGB OLED technology. LG’s WRGB-technology for OLED production uses color filters on top of a white self-emissive light.
These filters are not as prone to premature aging, and are more cost effective in mass production. LG’s technology, does, however, have limitations in achieving the peak brightness levels and stability of quantum-dot LED displays.
LG said its approach avoids most of the issues Samsung listed as problems with its RGB-approach to OLED technology, while achieving nearly perfect black reproduction.
According to the report: Samsung’s QLED technology uses quantum dots of varying sizes from two to 10 nanometers and a self-illuminating element like OLED without the need of a separate BLU (Back-Light Unit).
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Quantum dots produce different colors that change in relation to the size of the dot. These dots are made of inorganic materials that are not affected by heat, contributing to bright vibrant colors that are also very stable, regardless of the amount of energy used to drive them.
Quantum dot technology helps to produce displays with significantly wider color gamuts and contributes to boosting color brightness in high dynamic range (HDR) images.
By Greg Tarr
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