LG to show off world’s largest OLED panel

LG Display says it’s created the world’s largest OLED TV panel, at 55 inches, and plans to show it at CES next month.

“Our objective has always been to actively define and lead emerging display technology markets,” says Dr Sang Beom Han, CEO and executive vice president of LG Display.

“Although OLED technology is seen as the future of TV display, the technology has been limited to smaller display sizes and by high costs, until now. LG Display’s 55-inch OLED TV panel has overcome these barriers.”

The company says the panel produces ‘remarkable’ image quality with no after image, thanks to its high reaction velocity. It also has a contrast ratio of over 100,000:1 and a wider color range than that of LCD panels.

While the screen is a prototype and unlikely to hit store shelves any time soon, the company says it’s proof that it’s possible to make such large screens at a reasonable cost. It’s produced using an Oxide TFT backplane technology which is similar to the existing TFT process, but with amorphous silicon replaced with oxide.

The end result, says LG, is a screen with identical image quality to that of LTPS base panels, but at a much lower cost.

Because the new panel, unlike LCD panels, allows diodes to be turned on or off, power consumption can be kept down. And because there’s no need for a special light source, the structure of the panel has been simplified, meaning it’s just 5mm thick and weighs less than LCD panels.

It uses White OLED (WOLED), which vertically accumulates red, green, and blue diodes. With white color light emitting from the diode, it displays screen information through color layers below the TFT base panel – leading to a lower error rate, higher productivity, and a clearer Ultra Definition screen thanks to small pixels.