Display Industry Awards

Apple Vision Pro is a revolutionary spatial computer that seamlessly blends digital content with the physical world, while allowing users to stay present and connected to others. Vision Pro creates an infinite canvas for apps that scales beyond the boundaries of a traditional display and introduces a fully three-dimensional user interface controlled by the most natural and intuitive inputs possible—a user's eyes, hands, and voice. Vision Pro lets users interact with digital content in a way that feels like it is physically present in their space.

Samsung Display's quantum-dot OLED (QD-OLED) is composed of many groundbreaking innovations, from QDs to blue self-emitting pixels and an oxide thin-film transistor (TFT) back- plane. QD-OLED integrates the first printed red and green QDs with self-emitting blue OLED. QDs are advanced nanoscale materials that emit precise wavelengths of light. Blue OLED source light is photoconverted into precise red and green light, creating color using color conversion. This unique difference allows QD-OLED displays to produce flawless life-like color accurately and consistently. When expressing the primary colors of QD-OLED, the narrow bandwidth characteristic offers a pure color spectrum that has the capability to create more than 90 percent coverage of the BT.2020 standard and more than 99 percent coverage of the Digital Cinema Initiatives–Protocol 3 (DCI-P3 color space).

The Apple Liquid Retina XDR Display on the 12.9-inch iPad Pro and 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro features extreme dynamic range with 1,000-nit full-screen-sustaining capa¬bility and 1,600-nit peak high luminance, with a 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio. A DCI-P3 wide color gamut with 1 billion colors delivers rich and vibrant colors. ProMotion display technology, with variable refresh rates within 24–120 Hz, delivers a responsive viewing experience. Ultralow reflectivity helps users stay focused on the content, even in high ambient lighting conditions. Each display is carefully calibrated in the factory, and when combined with color man¬agement that’s built into iPadOS and macOS, the Liquid Retina XDR Display delivers an optimal view¬ing experience.

Eco² OLED is a technology that removes the polarizer, which is used to reduce the reflection of external light and integrates its functionality into the OLED panel layer. The Eco²OLED display is eco-friendly by reducing the use of plastics. The technology improves energy efficiency and reduces power consumption.

The curved large MBUX Hyperscreen is the first automotive series pillar-to-pillar unit and is the highlight in the new electric architecture Gen.2 interior program. A smart combina­tion and integration of three innovative displays behind one curved cover glass merge almost seam­lessly to create a customer experience of more than 141 centimeters appearing as one visual unit.

Sony has developed an LED Virtual Production (VP) system that enables a novel approach to film production. It works by displaying volumetrically cap­tured images on its new direct-view “Crystal LED” B-series display as a background image, allowing for shooting of that background image with live subjects with its digital cinema camera, “VENICE.” The com­bined volumetric image then is edited and rendered through “Atom View,” a point-cloud rendering, editing, and coloring software solution from Sony Innovation Studios. Image perspective can be synchronized with camera motion, and the process, when viewed as a new production system, provides a new and efficient workflow for film and other content production.

The 3M HARP lens integrates a birefringent reflective polarizer used to produce compact, mid-field-of-view (FoV) eyepieces and wide-FoV optics for virtual reality (VR) head-mounted displays using folded optics in the lens configuration. Multiple configurations for folded optic lens systems may be optimized, with varying performance relative to refractive systems. Polarization control is an important consideration, and different components cause different polarizing effects. Further, there are addi­tional benefits of using folded optics in designs for mid- and wide-FoV in VR systems.

compared with traditional leds, minileds have smaller particle size and higher brightness, which can bring better display effects to the lcd with a miniled back­light unit. meanwhile, it is more energy-efficient and supports accurate local dim­ming to avoid the uniformity problem that occurs with led backlight units. the active-matrix (am) driving glass substrate technology adopted by the chip-on-glass (cog) miniled backlight unit from boe is based on semiconductor technology and uses a glass substrate through boe’s lateral processing technology. glass is more suitable for making led backlight arrays with dense arrange­ment and heat concentration. the miniled unit is directly bonded to the glass substrate to realize the high-speed transfer of the led chips and can realize precise, independent dimming control of the back­light unit.

The xQDEF Diffuser Plate brings together the color and brightness performance of QDEF quantum-dot (QD) technology with the precise light diffusion necessary for perfect contrast levels in miniLED and full-array local-dimming LCDs. As a direct replacement for diffuser plate components in direct-lit LCDs, the xQDEF Diffuser Plate simplifies the display assembly process, allowing display makers to design and build the most cost-effective displays with the widest color gamut. Compared with other wide color gamut solutions, the xQDEF Diffuser Plate implementation results in close to no additional material costs. By the end of 2021, more than a million TVs with xQDEF Diffuser Plates inside shipped into the market.

Displays of the Year

LG Display: 65-Inch Rollable TV
TCL: Q8 Series MiniLED TV

Display Applications of the Year

Facebook: Oculus Quest 2
Lenovo Group: Thinkpad X1 Fold

Display Components Of the Year

Schott: Xensation Flex Ultra-Thin Cover Glass
SigmaSense: SigmaDrive SDC100 Touch Controller

With its 32‐inch LCD panel, 6K Retina resolution, and over 20 million pixels, Apple Pro Display XDR (Fig . 1) sets a new bar for the capabilities of a professional display. Designed for pro users who rely on color accuracy and true‐to‐life image reproduction, such as photographers, video editors, 3D animators, and colorists, Pro Display XDR delivers the most comprehensive set of features ever offered on a display in its price range.

Featuring P3 wide color and 10‐bit color depth, Pro Display XDR is expertly calibrated at the factory to ensure billions of colors can be reproduced with exceptional accuracy. And features such as built‐in reference modes make it easy to match the viewing requirements of content creation workflows. With 1000 nits of full‐screen sustained brightness and 1600 nits peak, a 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio, and an Apple‐designed backlight system for optimized light shaping, Pro Display XDR sets a new industry standard for reference‐quality imaging at a fraction of the size, weight, and cost of traditional reference monitors.

Here's how Pro Display XDR is engineered to produce industry‐leading imagery: Traditional LCD displays use edge‐lit backlight technology to diffuse light evenly across the display at the same brightness level. Instead, Pro Display XDR uses a locally dimmed backlight with 576 individual LEDs, controlled by an advanced algorithm in the timing controller chip. As a result, the display can exhibit incredibly bright, color‐accurate image areas and deep blacks simultaneously, delivering its 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio and up to 1600 nits peak brightness. An advanced thermal management system supports the display to maintain peak brightness indefinitely in environments up to 25° C. With these features, Pro Display XDR introduces Extreme Dynamic Range (XDR), far outperforming typical HDR brightness specifications for desktop displays and enabling pros to work with true‐to‐life content.

Pro Display XDR also incorporates several innovations to optimize image quality compared to traditional LCD displays. First, to minimize “blooming,” a halo effect surrounding bright objects on dark backgrounds, an Apple‐designed cavity reflector is layered on top of the LEDs and optimized geometrically. Along with several additional custom lenses and reflective layers, it directs the light upward while reducing halo effects and preserving light uniformity.

Second, Pro Display XDR has an industry‐leading polarizer technology that preserves image fidelity at a super‐wide viewing angle, allowing each team member in a studio or on set to see the same color and contrast, regardless of viewing angle. And finally, for pros working in uncontrolled lighting environments, Pro Display XDR introduces an innovative matte option called nano‐texture. While a typical matte engineering process adds a coating to the surface to scatter light but also inadvertently reduces contrast, nano‐texture is etched into the glass itself at the nanometer level, producing less glare and low reflectivity while maintaining contrast.

With its incredible color and advanced calibration, Extreme Dynamic Range with industry‐leading brightness and contrast, and innovative display technologies, Pro Display XDR provides image quality and performance previously reserved for high‐end reference monitors.

The display industry has experimented with various technologies to better reflect natural images and a wide range of colors on screens, and with the emergence of LED local dimming and HDR, display performance has substantially improved. However, traditional LCD screens’ brightness has long been considered relatively high in low grayscale. In other words, it isn't black enough, and it's difficult to use local image technology to differentiate the sense of depth with a high‐contrast ratio.

As a breakthrough in thin‐film transistor (TFT)‐LCD technology, BOE's dual‐cell panel (Fig . 2) — referred to as “BD Cell” for short—offers several important technical advancements that conventional LCD screens don't. The display uses pixel‐level ultra‐fine backlight control technology and a brand‐new integrated circuit (IC) driving technology to make the million‐level contrast ratio rate and 12 bits’ color depth come true, accurately displaying more natural and true‐to‐life colors.

The contrast ratio of a conventional LCD screen is 3,000:1 with 0.2 nits as the lowest brightness. The BD Cell's screen is capable of raising the contrast ratio up to 150,000:1 and decreasing brightness to 0.003 nit. In terms of combining LED local dimming with BD Cell technology, the contrast ratio can be as high as 2,000,000:1. Moreover, while a conventional LCD screen's color depth is 8 bit, BD Cell is capable of boosting the color depth as high as 12 bit with an enhanced IC driving algorithm. On the other hand, BD Cell incorporates advantages of an LCD screen's stableness and technological maturity, with no image sticking.

Equipped with an advanced dimension switch screen, BD Cell combines a main cell and subcell, which plays a key role in dividing the backlight into a million zones with the function of a liquid crystal light valve. According to the company, the process of combining the subcell and main cell was not without its challenges: BOE's engineers had to troubleshoot problems such as Newton rings caused by packing, the Moire phenomenon, and image dislocation caused by pixel‐level alignment deviation along the way.

In the end, “the successful development of BD Cell substantially increases the lifespan and the competitiveness of LCD technology, bringing a better visual experience to consumers and more possibilities for the entire display industrial chain,” says Feng Yuan, vice president of BOE Technology Group.

With the global launch of its Galaxy Fold phone (Fig . 3) last year, Samsung accomplished a few different things. For starters, it set the standard for the nascent foldable display category and demonstrated the product's potential as a next‐generation device. And, considering how long the industry has floated the concept of foldables, treating it, for decades, as a symbol of the future, it also marked a generational milestone. (The company first showed flexible prototype displays at the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show, which shows how hard it has worked to achieve a true foldable.)

Samsung's first‐of‐its‐kind device bridges a smartphone and tablet with the help of two AMOLED displays: a 4.6‐inch external screen and an internal screen that expands to 7.3 inches when unfolded. That interior display's size gives way to a powerful multitasking feature by operating three applications simultaneously. It also has a picture quality of up to Quad Extended Graphics Array (QXGA+) resolution and a pure color gamut and peak luminance of up to 600 cd/m2, letting users fully immerse themselves in various types of content such as gaming and video streaming. Indeed, according to the company, wide screen but compact size is no longer something users expect to see only in a sci‐fi film.

To achieve those specifications, Samsung has developed highly effective electroluminescent material and highly durable components. To make an inward foldable display with a bending radius of 1.5 millimeters (mm), all the layers within the panel should be folded without causing any cracks. As a result, the foldable display employs a cover window made of flexible, hardened plastic. Samsung says that it successfully reduced the thickness by more than 50 percent by taking advantage of materials that enable ultra‐thin layers. Furthermore, the stress of various layers (including the TFT, light‐emitting layers, polarizing plate, and cover window) is appropriately dispersed, allowing the product to pass a strict bending test more than 200,000 cycles.

Though volumes for the foldable market are expected to be small for several years, Samsung considers its foldable display as a stepping stone in revolutionizing display form factors. Going forward, Samsung says the form‐factor revolution will be highly significant for enhancing mobile devices.

After years of using handheld devices, consumers have come to develop certain expectations of displays. They expect them to be durable with a smooth‐touch feel, yet sensitive for accurate finger swiping, touching, and tapping. Manufacturers have used glass to deliver on those expectations, but with the proliferation of displays in automotive interior dashboards, new challenges arise. Namely, how can glass be used to ensure a satisfying experience for consumers while also addressing ambient light conditions and adhering to auto industry reliability and safety regulations?

To be sure, although requirements for each country's automotive testing body slightly differ, interior dashboard designs must pass similar requirements around the globe as part of headform impact tests (HIT). HIT simulates a driver's or passenger's head hitting the dashboard after being propelled forward during a car accident. Because success is measured by the type of breakage in the dashboard, material choices and display cover choices are crucial. With those challenges in mind, Corning introduced its auto interior glass solutions AutoGrade™ Corning Gorilla Glass (Fig . 4) in January 2019.

According to Corning, AutoGrade™ Gorilla Glass can help enable a variety of in‐vehicle display designs while eliminating the need for plastic antisplinter films. Moreover, it's designed to help display modules pass industry reliability tests. And with automotive designers extending displays across dashboards in new sizes and curved configurations, Corning is able to transfer the benefits from AutoGrade glass to curved display areas using its proprietary Corning ColdForm™ Technology.

Shaped or curved pieces of glass traditionally are contoured through “hot forming,” a process in which the glass is first molded in a bending furnace or pressed into shape while in liquid form. From that point on, the rest of the manufacturing process must be completed on a shaped piece: The ion‐exchange tank for chemical strengthening will need to accommodate shaped parts and, further down the line, coating and ink applications as well as final packaging and shipping must be calculated to uniformly coat the curves.

In contrast, Corning's ColdForm Technology enables the glass to be bent at room temperature as a final step. This means the glass travels through the manufacturing process—chemical strengthening, coating application, and printing—in a flat state before being curved at the end. Completing these process steps on a flat piece of glass cuts down on processing time and costs, as machines can accommodate more parts and coatings are applied more uniformly.

As displays move beyond simple infotainment purposes and become tools vital for assessing critical driving information, the need for high‐tech glass is clear, says Corning. AutoGrade™ Gorilla Glass can help enable automotive displays that are larger, longer, and shaped to bring next‐generation capabilities on the road and, ultimately, help the industry differentiate with curved console designs.

As automotive displays increase in size and sophistication, physical knobs and dials are being replaced by streamlined surfaces inside the cabin. Enter haptic technology specialists such as Tanvas. A Chicago‐based company founded in 2011 by two Northwestern University professors, Tanvas has been developing the next generation of multitouch and haptic technology. TanvasTouch surface haptics are programmable textures and tactile effects that can be felt with the swipe of a finger across a physically smooth touchscreen, trackpad, or any touch‐enabled surface (Fig . 5).

TanvasTouch uses an electric field to modulate friction where the finger moves across a surface. (It can be deployed on surfaces of any shape, with suitable substrates including glass, plastic, metal, ceramics, and natural surfaces.) Those changes in friction are perceived as fine textures, edges, and bumps that can be felt without looking. The company also offers TanvasTouch for Automotive, the first automotive solution to produce programmable textures and effects with a solid‐state actuator. Traditional vibration‐based haptics are unsuitable for large or curved automotive displays because they require the display to move. TanvasTouch is a solid‐state haptic solution that eliminates the need for costly dampening structures to be built into the display assembly while helping drivers keep their eyes on the road through the use of search haptics that allow the driver to find and adjust controls without looking.

Nonvibrating surface haptic technology introduces new options for automotive manufacturers to reimagine the vehicle's interior design and feel. Car manufacturers can create a uniform or harmonious touch experience across multiple surfaces—not just the display screen, but also the steering wheel, exterior door handle, and even upholstery. According to Tanvas, automotive manufacturers can implement its technology with a combination of a proprietary controller solution (which performs multitouch sensing and haptic control), supplied in various forms (including as an IC or as a module), and transform the multitouch sensor panel to a combined multitouch and haptic actuator for any surface.

Although quantum dot (QD) technology realizes a high color gamut for LCD, most QD materials are cadmium (Cd)‐based, raising concerns about their potential toxicity: Exposure to cadmium has been connected to cancer and other serious health issues, as well as environmental harms. As a result, Cd‐based QD materials are not widely accepted in the display market, and the industry has shifted its focus to finding nontoxic alternatives. Still, Cd‐free QD materials can bring their own challenges, including issues with low luminance and color purity.

Because one of Toray's core offerings is organic emitting materials with high color purity for organic EL devices, the company wondered if they might be useful for a high color gamut LCD and began developing the SCO sheet (Fig . 6). In the beginning, the biggest issue with the organic emitting materials was their lifetime. However, Toray ultimately achieved a lifetime 1,400 times longer compared to the initial development stage.

According to the company, their SCO sheet is especially innovative for a few reasons. First, the high color purity of Toray's organic emitting material is based on a full width at half maximum (FWHM) parameter that's much narrower than any other organic emitting materials so far developed. So by using the SCO sheet, a high color gamut LCD can be realized. In particular, the sheet can cover both Digital Cinema Initiatives (DCI)‐P3 and Adobe specifications.

Second, Toray says its original organic emitting material has a higher quantum efficiency than that of non‐Cd QDs. Therefore, an approximately 10 percent higher luminance can be realized with the sheet than with non‐Cd QDs. For that reason, the SCO sheet can contribute to lower power consumption of the LCD panel.

Because Toray's SCO sheet is free of toxic elements, it's not restricted by various environmental regulations, including the European Unions’ Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) Directive. Finally, with the sheet, more than 99 percent of DCI and more than 99 percent of Adobe coverage can be achieved in one LCD panel. (According to the company, non‐Cd QDs can't say the same.) Recently, in the PC monitor market, there has been a strong demand for compatibility of DCI and Adobe in one PC monitor. Toray believes that with the SCO sheet, it will be able to develop a new PC monitor market.

Although OLED is a well‐known way to apply organic electronics materials to the display industry, this is the first instance of applying organic emitting materials to the LCD industry, an achievement that expands the possibilities of organic electronics materials.

Last year, Audi's plans to shift to the production of fully electric cars came into clearer focus: Not only were models of the Audi e‐tron, the company's first high‐volume all‐electric car, delivered to consumers, but Audi said that it intends to debut more than 30 electrified cars—20 of them fully electric—by 2025.

With this pivot from gas‐powered cars, the need for a virtual side mirror (Fig . 7)—consisting of small exterior side cameras and a door‐mounted interior display—became even more pronounced, according to Bernhard Senner, an engineer in Development Innovations User Experience/User Interface at Audi. The company debuted the mirror as an option in the all‐electric Audi e‐tron, and it's currently available in Europe. (Because of regulations, the e‐tron is only available in the US without the virtual side mirrors.)

What's the common thread between virtual mirrors and Audi's electric ambitions? With its aerodynamic design, the virtual side mirror reduces wind noise. That's a plus for electric cars, which are already noticeably quieter than combustion cars because they don't have engines. What's more, the mirror reduces drag, giving the vehicle a few miles more range.

Beyond that, Senner says, they also offer practical benefits in terms of comfort and safety. With their sophisticated image processing, the displays provide a much better image than a conventional mirror can in certain situations, such as driving in direct sunlight. The mirrors also adjust automatically to three driving situations: highway, turning, and parking. On the highway, the field of vision is reduced so that the driver can better estimate speeds when driving fast, and Senner says if the driver signals an intention to turn or change lanes by indicating, the indicator view extends the relevant side's image detail to reduce the blind spot. The field of vision is extended downward when maneuvering and parking, and the display visualizes the turn signal as a green contour on its outer frame and displays notifications from the Audi side‐assist lane‐change assistant and exit warning.

A 7‐inch OLED was selected for the virtual exterior mirror. In early test drives, Senner notes, Audi realized that the limited contrast of an LCD and especially the slow response time in low temperatures was a significant issue. “So it became clear very early, that we have to use an OLED display for this application, because with the dark black and the temperature, independent fast switching‐time OLED is the best solution,” he says.

The camera is integrated into the hexagonal end of the virtual mirror's flat supports and its images are digitally processed and displayed on high‐contrast, 1,280 × 800‐pixel OLED displays in the transition between the instrument panel and door.

“The feedback we got from our customers was very positive,” Senner says. “Everybody who ordered this option would buy it again. So the story with virtual side mirrors with OLED displays will be continued.”