OLED lighting in 2010

The OLED lighting industry saw its first commercial products, albeit extremely expensive ones, in 2009, which begs the question: Will 2010 be the year for ‘affordable’ OLED lighting?

The answer appears to be "no”. While companies have achieved significant strides in OLED performance, high material and manufacturing costs still leave OLEDs with a high price tag. This is not to say that there’s nothing to look forward to in 2010. On the contrary, we expect to see more ‘products’ being commissioned by designers and luminaire companies. This onslaught of products will bring OLED lighting to the forefront of public attention, possibly giving it the interest needed to push up demand to justify the construction of large-scale OLED lighting manufacturing lines, which would bring down prices, making 2011 the first year for ‘more affordable’ OLED lighting products.

Year in review

Last year was supposed to see the commercial take-off of OLED televisions. But instead, OLED lighting seems to have taken the front seat for OLED producers. Opportunities for OLED displays hadn’t proved as great as hoped, so some producers turned to lighting applications.

Lighting seems to present opportunities that are both simpler technically than displays and where entrenched technologies (light bulbs, fluorescent tubes) seemed easier to push aside. OLED lighting is also extremely simple, ie, a lamp can be one large pixel, whereas displays have thousands of pixels and may need active matrix backplanes. Furthermore, OLED lighting received substantial government funding for R&D in several countries.

The big news for 2009 was the introduction of the first OLED lighting products. Osram introduced the world’s first ‘functional table light’ based on OLED technology although it was only available in small quantities. However, it gave some clarity as to what can be achieved in the OLED market.

What’s on the horizon?

The ‘big three’ lighting companies - GE, Osram and Philips - appear to be setting the stage for OLED lighting, indicating the level of acceptable performance and introducing lighting panels with that performance for designers to get a feel for.

In November, Osram announced the Orbeos panel, its first OLED product on the market. Orbeos can be switched on and off without delay, is continuously dimmable and, unlike LEDs, its heat management is simple. Brightness level is typically 1000 cd/m², with power input of less than 1 W and a lifespan of around 5000 hours under ideal operating conditions. Osram claims that, after demonstrating what it considers to be high performance (efficiency and lifetime), it is now shifting its focus from technical development to “process management and reliability for future products”. This statement leaves NanoMarkets to believe that 5000 hours is an acceptable lifetime for an OLED lighting product. As well, it also indicates that the first ‘real’ products will be in the form of small tiles, instead of one large sheet.

Osram doesn’t expect to have volume OLED lighting products until 2016. It plans to transition into this high volume in 2012 by selling to the design community, where the target customer will value some unique quality of the product, such as transparency.

Philips started selling its OLED-based Lumiblade lighting wafers, but has been quiet on the OLED front since that time. When releasing the product, Philips announced that it would start shipping commercial products in 2010. The company didn’t respond to NanoMarkets' inquiry, but we expect to see something from Philips at the upcoming lighting fairs.

GE previously announced that it would begin volume production of flexible OLED-based lighting panels in 2010. Its most recent announcement was in December to announce a joint development of self-powered OLED lighting devices with Power Paper. The 12-month collaboration will combine Power Paper’s thin-film batteries with GE’s OLED technology to develop “a first generation of self-powered OLED lighting products and identify next-generation technologies with enhanced capabilities”.

Not just the ‘big three’

In addition to the ‘big three’ lighting firms, other companies, including materials suppliers, are likely to influence the first generation of OLED lighting products. Specifically, Merck, Novaled, LG Electronics (through its acquisition of Kodak’s OLED business in December 2009), Sumation, UDC, DuPont and Dow Corning will play major roles. Printing industry giants, like Avery Dennison, Toppan Printing and Dai Nippon Printing, may also assist with expertise in functional printing technologies.

NanoMarkets expects more companies to appear in 2010, most likely demonstrating technologies on a small scale, before being acquired by larger companies.

In summary

NanoMarkets expects 2010 to see more OLED lighting products and moves by the larger companies to start transitioning into high-volume manufacturing. We expect the ‘big three’ to demonstrate new products, ie, new ways of incorporating OLEDs into lighting products at the lighting fairs.