Apple in talks with Samsung to use OLED in next iPad

[ped]

http://www.koreaherald.com/business/Detail.jsp?newsMLId=20110525000755

Apple COO Tim Cook visited Korea to discuss bilateral cooperation

Apple Inc.’s chief operating officer Tim Cook discussed adopting Samsung’s AMOLED display technology for tablet PCs during his recent visit to South Korea, industry sources said.

“Apple wants to tap into Samsung’s AMOLED technology for an upgraded version of the iPad 2, considered as many by the iPad 3 that is likely to be launched toward the end of this year,” a source told The Korea Herald on Wednesday on condition of anonymity.

Tim Cook is not only the COO, but also acting CEO of Apple. During Cook’s trip last week, Apple seems to have offered Samsung an advance for the AMOLED displays, the source said.

The California-based company currently uses liquid crystal displays in its iPad lineup, including the iPad 2 it launched in March this year.

Samsung does not yet use AMOLED displays for its tablet PC, the Galaxy Tab, but its Galaxy S 2 smartphones are fitted with the super-AMOLED display. The local firm is now said to be mulling over using the display for its second generation of tablet PCs.

A Samsung Mobile Display spokesperson said he had not heard of such discussions with Apple.

Reports of Apple’s offer come despite a legal spat between the world’s two most powerful electronics companies over patent infringements.

Previously, there had been contradictory assessments over whether AMOLED technology is compatible with tablet PCs, but AMOLED displays have improved to the point where they are now considered to have significant advantage over LCDs.

Super AMOLED displays, for instance, tout brighter screens, less sunlight reflection and reduced power consumption.

Apple’s shift to AMOLED spells much trouble for LG Display, one of Apple’s main suppliers for LCDs and Samsung’s main rivals.

LG Display, a top global manufacturer of liquid crystal displays, supplies Apple with the iPad displays.

Speculation has it that the company may try to hold Apple’s attention by adding a new display assembly line at its Gumi plant in order to meet the growing demand for the iPad 2.

 

[SPEEDwithJJ]

I humbly think that this is good news. Using the OLED screens may just "eliminate" all this LCD "crap" found in some of the current iPad 2 units.

 

[blackNBUK]

I'm not sure about this rumour. Last I heard, supply of mobile phone sized OLED displays wasn't great and there wasn't any tablet sized OLED displays at a sensible cost. However Samsung did recently demo a high-res tablet sized LCD display...

 

[NutsNGum]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

Would be nice, they look great.

 

[ped]

I humbly think that this is good news. Using the OLED screens may just "eliminate" all this LCD "crap" found in some of the current iPad 2 units.

There certainly won't be any backlight issues like were seen on the iPad 2 on release.

 

[ped]

I'm not sure about this rumour. Last I heard, supply of mobile phone sized OLED displays wasn't great and there wasn't any tablet sized OLED displays at a sensible cost. However Samsung did recently demo a high-res tablet sized LCD display...

Samsung is making between 6 and 8 million OLED screens per month, which is on its way to ramping to nearly 40 million/month about this time next year. The new gen 5.5 factory came online earlier this month (2 months ahead of schedule) and is why we've already ramped from 3 million to 6-8 million.

This trend may also be why Apple delayed announcing the iPhone 5 until August, to give this factory time to ramp up production to meet their demand.

Also, I wouldn't call this iPad info a rumor; it's also on Yahoo News as well.

http://my.news.yahoo.com/apple-samsung-talks-over-displays-ipad-3-104003917.html

 

[Piggie]

Oh for the joys of finally getting rid of LCD screens.

There are children alive today that have never knows what a black screen actually looks like !

 

[ped]

Oh for the joys of finally getting rid of LCD screens.

There are children alive today that have never knows what a black screen actually looks like !

I can tell you're an advanced lifeform both by your opinions on OLED and LCD and by the "Amiga 500" in your tagline. I'm an old Amiga fan myself!

Boing on!

 

[tekker]

I'm seriously thinking that Apple will drop the lawsuit against Samsung for this deal. Honestly, these displays are soo much better that it'd be worth it.

 

[SRLMJ23]

I'm not sure I believe this rumor simply because Apple is currently in litigation with Samsung.

To me it would be a little weird to be suing a company and at the same time buying products from them, but I guess it's possible.

 

[Built]

It would be great if true. Hopefully they can offer it at a reasonable price point compared to current models.

 

[ped]

I'm not sure I believe this rumor simply because Apple is currently in litigation with Samsung.

To me it would be a little weird to be suing a company and at the same time buying products from them, but I guess it's possible.

I don't think Apple can build their products without using Samsung products, even if they wanted to.

 

[Piggie]

I can tell you're an advanced lifeform both by your opinions on OLED and LCD and by the "Amiga 500" in your tagline. I'm an old Amiga fan myself!

Boing on!

Well, as soon as got a job I went out an rented a Sony Trinitron TV. The best tube you could get, Massive brightness and dead flat vertically decades before any other flat screens.
Then went on to buy a 27" Trinitron which was a top of the range, second only to the Profile screen.
Then the 1st LCD's came out and I could not believe how horrid they were. I remember even after they were in shops for a few years, and coming down to the £1000 mark, I said to shop assistants how terrible the picture was.
I was told I was standing too close and had to look at them further away so I could not see all the graininess and colour patches.
I could not believe how bad they were against my Sony CRT screen for it's clean picture and of course jet black blacks.

Few more years went by and finally, after seeing some proper HD feeding a LCD and also wanting to go widescreen for my games consoles I sold my Sony to a friend, who is still using it today, despite it being, ohhh, must be 20 to 25 years old.

 

[psonice]

Seems doubtful to me. The problem with tablet OLED screens wasn't so much production capacity as cost - are they now making them at 10" sizes and at LCD prices? If this rumour was for the iphone screen, it'd be more realistic.

I actually think a lot of these stories are made up by apple's rivals, purely to build up unrealistic expectations so the actual product seems disappointing

 

[ped]

Well, as soon as got a job I went out an rented a Sony Trinitron TV. The best tube you could get, Massive brightness and dead flat vertically decades before any other flat screens.
Then went on to buy a 27" Trinitron which was a top of the range, second only to the Profile screen.
Then the 1st LCD's came out and I could not believe how horrid they were. I remember even after they were in shops for a few years, and coming down to the £1000 mark, I said to shop assistants how terrible the picture was.
I was told I was standing too close and had to look at them further away so I could not see all the graininess and colour patches.
I could not believe how bad they were against my Sony CRT screen for it's clean picture and of course jet black blacks.

Few more years went by and finally, after seeing some proper HD feeding a LCD and also wanting to go widescreen for my games consoles I sold my Sony to a friend, who is still using it today, despite it being, ohhh, must be 20 to 25 years old.

In total agreement regarding how lame LCDs are/were. In fact I even started a firestorm over on the ExtremeTech forums years ago on the subject, demonstrating why LCDs suck for gaming. Check it out on the URL below.

http://discuss.extremetech.com/forums/1004319786/ShowPost.aspx

 

[ped]

Seems doubtful to me. The problem with tablet OLED screens wasn't so much production capacity as cost - are they now making them at 10" sizes and at LCD prices? If this rumour was for the iphone screen, it'd be more realistic.

I actually think a lot of these stories are made up by apple's rivals, purely to build up unrealistic expectations so the actual product seems disappointing

I don't think OLED screens cost as much as you think. Or perhaps you don't realize that devices with OLED can command a price premium.

Here is the info straight from the Gabelli stock report on PANL and from iSuppli - the red spots are the OLED screens and they're no more expensive than the LCDs. So it wouldn't surprise me to find that with Samsung's new gen 5.5 OLED factory churning out displays using the latest techniques that the 10" OLEDs aren't much more expensive than the LCDs of the same size (at least not enough to matter given the price premium a manufacturer can get for a device with OLED).

 

[bufffilm]

I'm not sure I believe this rumor simply because Apple is currently in litigation with Samsung.

To me it would be a little weird to be suing a company and at the same time buying products from them, but I guess it's possible.

samsung is one of the manufacturers for the ipad screens. (it wouldn't surprise me if they're also manufacturing other components for other Apple products)

business is business and when there are millions/billions at stake, companies that are suing each other might still remain bedfellows.

 

[psonice]

I don't think OLED screens cost as much as you think. Or perhaps you don't realize that devices with OLED can command a price premium.

That's certainly true for small sized phone screens, but take a look at the prices for TV screens. OLED is incredibly expensive. That would put a 10" screen in the 'too expensive' category, unless as you say Samsung's new factory is going to bring the costs down fast (possible, it happened for phone sized screens). I can't see apple increasing the ipad price (there could well be pressure for a price cut by next year), so I can't see them paying much more than LCD costs for the screen.

I think it's still unlikely. For apple to consider it for the ipad 3, Samsung would need to start producing LARGE volumes, probably 5m per month or more, the price would have to drop a lot, reliability + yield would have to be proven, and ideally there would have to be more than one factory producing (or any accident at the factory = no more ipads!)

 

[ped]

That's certainly true for small sized phone screens, but take a look at the prices for TV screens. OLED is incredibly expensive. That would put a 10" screen in the 'too expensive' category, unless as you say Samsung's new factory is going to bring the costs down fast (possible, it happened for phone sized screens). I can't see apple increasing the ipad price (there could well be pressure for a price cut by next year), so I can't see them paying much more than LCD costs for the screen.

I think it's still unlikely. For apple to consider it for the ipad 3, Samsung would need to start producing LARGE volumes, probably 5m per month or more, the price would have to drop a lot, reliability + yield would have to be proven, and ideally there would have to be more than one factory producing (or any accident at the factory = no more ipads!)

Again I must wonder where you're getting these numbers. If Apple has only sold 15 million iPads in 2 years, why would they need 5 million iPad screens a month?

And, as I've mentioned, Samsung will be capable of producing 8 million screens (of cellphone size) per month by the end of this year from the new gen 5.5 (they're already doing about 6 million per month now with all OLED production) and by this time next year that will be 30 million per month. iPad screens can be made from that same size substrate but obviously at lower numbers than the above. But still far more than Apple needs.

As for OLED being expensive that's been true of every new technology, including plasma and LCD (anyone remember the first $10,000 LCD TVs? I do). That's simply a function of time and growing the market. Samsung and others are already decreasing investment in LCD as OLED is growing to take its place. And OLED will be used for white lighting as well, which increases the ramping speed for displays as well. Universal Display just showed an OLED white light (among many) that has 58 lumens/watt with a 30,000 hour to 70% of initial brightness lifetime. That's over 13 YEARS of 6 hours/day lighting at a large cost savings of electricity every year. And the panel itself would last even longer - perhaps 20 years? And that lifetime is 3 times as long as their OLED white lighting just one year ago.

http://www.oled-info.com/oled-light

 

[Sydde]

I would guess that OLED is not really on the near horizon for iPad, but they certainly could eliminate the bleeding issue and possibly improve battery life by using fully backlit LCD. Then the blacks would really be blacker, as they could turn off the LEDs behind the darkest pixels.

 

[ped]

I would guess that OLED is not really on the near horizon for iPad, but they certainly could eliminate the bleeding issue and possibly improve battery life by using fully backlit LCD. Then the blacks would really be blacker, as they could turn off the LEDs behind the darkest pixels.

I think you mean OLED? And OLEDs aren't backlighted *at all* as OLED is an emissive display type that generates its own light (part of the reason blacks are perfect and colors are better (doesn't pass through a color filter)).

 

[psonice]

Again I must wonder where you're getting these numbers. If Apple has only sold 15 million iPads in 2 years, why would they need 5 million iPad screens a month?

Well, the ipad has only been out for 1 year, and they sold 15 million. They're expected by the analysts to sell around 40 million this year with the ipad2. Next year? 60 million? That would be 5 million a month. I don't think that's unrealistic, but we'll have to wait and see.

And, as I've mentioned, Samsung will be capable of producing 8 million screens (of cellphone size) per month by the end of this year from the new gen 5.5 (they're already doing about 6 million per month now with all OLED production) and by this time next year that will be 30 million per month. iPad screens can be made from that same size substrate but obviously at lower numbers than the above. But still far more than Apple needs.

Let's be generous and assume that's 8 million 5" screens per month. If it's anything like LCD, it's not so much 'how many screens' as 'how much glass' they handle - the glass is then cut into screen sized pieces, and they can set it up so that they can get a couple of huge TVs or a hundred phone screens. For a 10" screen, you need 4x more glass than a 5" screen, so they could output 2m per month - not enough. Even taking all the output of their other factories, it's not enough. They need more supply than this, meaning other screens from other companies or more samsung factories.

As for OLED being expensive that's been true of every new technology, including plasma and LCD (anyone remember the first $10,000 LCD TVs? I do). That's simply a function of time and growing the market. Samsung and others are already decreasing investment in LCD as OLED is growing to take its place. And OLED will be used for white lighting as well, which increases the ramping speed for displays as well. Universal Display just showed an OLED white light (among many) that has 58 lumens/watt with a 30,000 hour to 70% of initial brightness lifetime. That's over 13 YEARS of 6 hours/day lighting at a large cost savings of electricity every year. And the panel itself would last even longer - perhaps 20 years? And that lifetime is 3 times as long as their OLED white lighting just one year ago.

http://www.oled-info.com/oled-light

I also remember an LCD pocket TV thing about 10 years before that, which was affordable

Bigger screens are much harder to make, that's why they cost more. There's a small chance of some small defect in a given area of screen. If you're making small screens, it might mean 1 in 20 screens is faulty (5% waste). If the screen is 20x bigger, most screens will have a fault somewhere. You could hit 95% failure rates. The big screen costs 20x more to make already, if you increase that by 20x to make up for the lost screens, it's 400x more.

Over time, the machines improve, and the failure rate falls - so the cost drops. But it takes time. Anyway, this is why the small screens are affordable now, but the big screens are still crazy expensive.

I'm sure it'll come, I just think it's a bit too early for the ipad. The iphone might come first, as it's a smaller screen, but that would take pretty much all of samsung's capacity even with the new factory. I think it's too early for that too. Expect to see more android/win7 phones with them though, as they don't need such massive numbers. Maybe next year for the iphone/pad?

 

[ped]

I'm sure it'll come, I just think it's a bit too early for the ipad. The iphone might come first, as it's a smaller screen, but that would take pretty much all of samsung's capacity even with the new factory. I think it's too early for that too. Expect to see more android/win7 phones with them though, as they don't need such massive numbers. Maybe next year for the iphone/pad?

I agree the iphone will be first. Maybe as soon as August when Apple announces it. And it won't take up anywhere near the full capacity Samsung is producing. Remember they're doing 8 million smartphone screens per month. Apple has only sold 50 million iphones over all models lifetimes. I'd think even with a new version like the iphone 5 they'd be lucky to sell 3-5 million per month. And Samsung is ramping towards 30 million/month within the next 12 months, so every month will see more supply than the last. Samsung is ready for the iphone 5 now.

 

[kiranmk2]

I don't think we'll see OLEDs that soon. OK, Samsung can now make more of them, but the current gen have a low-res pentile RGBG instead of the normal RGB layout which is going to prove problematic to get a retina-display res. Also, as has been pointed out, making larger screens is a big risk as the yields won't yet be there. Factor in the deluge of high-ppi LCDs coming this autumn and I think it's safe to say the iPad will have an LCD for at least another generation.

 

[psonice]

I agree the iphone will be first. Maybe as soon as August when Apple announces it. And it won't take up anywhere near the full capacity Samsung is producing. Remember they're doing 8 million smartphone screens per month. Apple has only sold 50 million iphones over all models lifetimes. I'd think even with a new version like the iphone 5 they'd be lucky to sell 3-5 million per month. And Samsung is ramping towards 30 million/month within the next 12 months, so every month will see more supply than the last. Samsung is ready for the iphone 5 now.

I think your figures are just a little on the low side there! From the last quarterly results:

- 18.6 million iphones sold.
- 9 million ipods (remember they share the same screen as the iphone normally), 50% were touches, so call it 4.5m

So, 23.1m devices in 3 months, or 7.7m per month. Even without the ipod, it's over 6m/month. And remember this is 6 months after the iphone 4 launched, and not a high sales (as in pre-christmas) period. Add a new device or holiday sales boost and you can expect a lot more than that.

Also, from the results: "189 million cumulative iOS device sales by end of March quarter". 15 million were ipads, so 174million iphones + ipod touches.