Better Success Rate

A 55 in. curved OLED TV from LG Electronics.
A 55 in. curved OLED TV from LG Electronics.

 

A Korean research team has successfully developed a technology to promise an ultra-high resolution OLED display, which are acknowledged to be next-gen displays, through a production conversion process. This technique is expected to be usable in the production of shadow masks for OLED display panels with a pixel density of 500 ppi, which is currently considered to be technically difficult to achieve.

A research team headed by Lee Eun-san, professor at the School of Mechanical Engineering at Inha University, has succeeded in the development of the production method and system of shadow masks for OLED display panels, where an electrochemical processing method is applied. They are going to transfer new manufacturing technology to a company and to embark on a follow-up joint study to commercialize the developed tech.

An increase in demand for ultra-high resolution displays has led to the growing importance of ultra-high-precision manufacturing technology for shadow masks. Shadow masks refer to metal film used to deliver red, blue, and green colors in OLED displays, which therefore determines the image resolution and color of the display panels. Korea depends entirely on imports.

The research team has successfully developed a method to manufacture shadow masks that could replace the etching process or technologies for laser-based manufacturing, securing a system to manufacture shadow masks for high-quality OLED displays.

In particular, the electrochemical processing technique makes high-quality minute shapes and surface processing possible, unlike existing manufacturing methods using electrochemical technology. Hence, it will be possible to produce high-precision shadow masks.

The team headed by Professor Lee anticipates that the newly-developed manufacturing method will be able to increase the yield rate of OLED displays by 30 percent by greatly reducing the failure rate of shadow masks. They believe that the method could be used in various areas where ultra-high-precision technology is needed, as in the case of not only displays but also extremely pure materials and sensor parts.

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