Question:
Tell us about the kind of products we can expect to see that will make use of organic EL display characteristics.
Televisions, PC monitors, notebook computers, cellphones, and various other products can take advantage of OEL. The highest demand is for PCs, but self-luminous televisions have a head start. That's because organic EL does well with changing imagery, whereas the fixed patterns that you have with menu bars tend to get burned into the display. The target size for an OEL display probably ranges from 2 to 20 inches. In the case of organic EL, each pixel activates with currents in orders of microamps. I think this is difficult with amorphous technology. For that, low temperature polysilicon technology is needed, but size limits depend heavily on the ability to mass produce low temperature polysilicon panels. The efficiency of organic EL will rise with the speed of that development, and we should see up to 20-inch devices by 2005 or 2006. But with the 40-inch class OEL panels for big-screen TVs, and we think that the deposition method for low molecular weight materials might be very tricky. However deposition technology will also be progressing, and with next-generation deposition equipment you'll see adequate support for even meter-sized panels. With high molecular weight materials you can form a film using injection techniques, so that's the easiest way to go. Today's polymers are single-layered but in the future if favorable materials emerge and multi-layered structures become possible, we can achieve even higher efficiencies and longer lifespans.
Equipment in the Kido Laboratory at Yamagata University
Vacuum deposition machine #1, "Taro"
