'OLEDoS technology had limits in brightness for AR devices'
Samsung Display has started the development of LED on silicon (LEDoS) microdisplay technology for applications in augmented reality (AR) devices.
Samsung Display Vice President and Head of Technology Strategy Team Gong Min Kim believed that in the coming future, LEDoS will replace OLED on silicon (OLEDoS) as the dominant display when it comes to AR devices.
OLEDoS had limitations in brightness, form factor, and lifespan for AR applications, Kim said during a conference in Seoul, South Korea, hosted by TheElec on Tuesday.
LEDoS had the capacity to overcome all these issues but the challenge was to make the LEDs small as possible but maintain their characteristics, the VP said.
Samsung Display was developing LEDoS with LEDs that were smaller than 10 micrometers and 5 micrometers, he said.
According to Kim, silicon wafer technology was the biggest obstacle as using semiconductor processes to make LED smaller in the past had resulted in the LED chips having completely different characteristics to those used in lamps.
So far, LED chips made smaller in the 20 micrometers and 10 micrometers ranges showed underwhelming performance and drastic characteristic changes.
These LEDs were truly MicroLED; those used in TVs used in LED chips should be classified as MiniLED, Kim said.
AR and other reality devices are near-eye displays and need to be conceptualized completely from existing displays used in larger devices, the VP said.
Flat panels of the past prioritized pixels per inch but for microdisplays the important thing was pixels per degree __ those with eyesights of 0.8 to 1 required 30 to 40ppd while those between 1.5 to 2.0 required 50 to 60ppd, the VP said.
Apple is currently using OLEDoS technology its Vision Pro reality device.
