Samsung, LGD Aim for Early Dominance in XR Market

Display companies such as Samsung Display and LG Display are accelerating the development of new technologies, such as OLED on Silicon (OLEDos), to preempt the Extended Reality (XR) industry like Apple’s “Vision Pro.”

According to industry sources on July 31, domestic display companies, including Samsung Display and LG Display, are focusing their R&D efforts on finding ways to increase the production efficiency of OLEDos. OLEDos refers to the deposition of Organic Light Emitting Diodes (OLED) on a silicon wafer substrate used in semiconductor production, which allows for lighter, flexible, and better-quality displays than current OLED TVs.

Expectations for market growth are rising as this display panel was adopted in Apple’s Vision Pro mixed reality (MR) headset launched last month. Previously released AR and VR devices mostly used LCD displays, but with the launch of the Vision Pro, there is an expectation in the industry that demand for OLEDos displays will increase.

The OLEDos in the first-generation Vision Pro was designed by Sony in Japan and produced by TSMC, a Taiwanese foundry company. However, due to complex processes and low yields, it is said to be struggling with the supply of parts.

Considering Apple’s brand power, the industry is highly anticipating Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics entering the market soon. This implies that the demand for OLEDos could increase rapidly, and the display company that first secures mass production technology will have the opportunity to lead the market.

As such, Samsung Display and LG Display are focusing on enhancing their technological capabilities in the field of microOLED. Samsung Display had acquired U.S.-based company eMagin for about 290 billion won (US$227 million) last May.

This company, albeit small, possesses leading technology in the red-green-blue (RGB) method OLED field, enabling it to implement panels with clearer picture quality and lower power compared to existing white OLEDs, hence the explanation from Samsung Display of its high utilization in the field of micro displays.

LG Display, currently supplying the external OLED display for Apple’s Vision Pro, revealed its OLEDos prototype at CES 2023 in Las Vegas in January. It is known that they are currently collaborating with LX Semicon, a fabless semiconductor design company, and SK hynix, which has strength in semiconductor manufacturing, for the production of MicroOLED chips.