Samsung, LG showcase new OLED products at K-Display 2024
Visitors take photos of Samsung Display's exhibitions during K-Display 2024 at COEX in southern Seoul, Wednesday. Courtesy of Samsung Electronics
Korean panel giants Samsung Display and LG Display showed off their new OLED products at K-Display 2024, which kicked off its three-day run Wednesday.
During the display exhibition, Samsung Display focused on various foldable displays, introducing its 360-degree folding flip-style display named Flex In & Out. The company also showcased the Flex S, which folds both inward and outward, and the Flex Hybrid, which combines foldable and slidable technologies.
A model demonstrates Samsung Display's Flex Hybrid display at the company's booth at K-Display 2024 in COEX, southern Seoul, Wednesday. Courtesy of Samsung Display
Samsung Display said it will demonstrate artificial intelligence (AI) interfaces on multi-foldable OLED displays to showcase its foldable technology's unique expandability and versatility.
During the exhibition, visitors can explore future AI experiences, including drawing and generating AI images on a two-split screen setup, using a three-split screen setup for taking photos, while at the same time, conducting AI searches and editing content for social media, Samsung Display said.
The company will also unveil a number of concept products for the first time in Korea, including a smart key with a 1.5-inch circular OLED, a smart band featuring a 6.2-inch flexible OLED and a smart speaker with a 7.6-inch flexible OLED.
"We will leverage our company's unique strengths in mobile OLED technology by collaborating with various system partners, such as Intel and Qualcomm, to extend these innovations into applications for IT OLED (IT devices excluding smartphones)," Samsung Display CEO Choi Joo-sun told reporters on the sidelines of the exhibition.
Samsung Display is supplying OLED panels for not only the Samsung Galaxy series but also Apple's iPhone series. Reportedly, Samsung Display will be supplying panels for four of the iPhone 16 family, which will debut later this year.
Models demonstrate LG Display's 18-inch slidable OLED panels for vehicles at the company's booth at K-Display 2024 in southern Seoul, Wednesday. Courtesy of LG Display
While Samsung Display was striving to fold and bend its panels, LG Display focused on increasing panel size and improving quality.
Highlighting LG Display's booth will be the 83-inch OLED TV panel. The company said this panel's peak brightness reaches 3,000 nits, which represents a 42 percent improvement in luminance compared to previous models, making it the brightest OLED TV panel in the market. A nit unit is equal to the brightness of a single candle.
For automotive displays, LG Display will introduce an advanced thin OLED, which is 20 percent thinner than existing glass-based OLEDs, thus enabling a sleek design for its clients.
Also, LG Display will present an 18-inch slidable OLED for vehicles, which is concealed in the ceiling of the backseat and rolls out for use to allow passengers to enjoy a large screen experience for watching movies, catching up on the news or conducting video conferences, all from within the vehicle.
"Based on our industry-leading OLED technologies, we will introduce innovative products that can provide distinguished customer values in every aspect, including quality, design and eco-friendliness," an LG Display official said.
Along with panel makers, Merck Korea also presented materials with high luminance, high transmittance, a short response time, high reliability, low energy consumption, improved device lifetime and optimized optical properties.
The company introduced flexible hard coating materials, liquid crystals, photoresists and other optical materials used in augmented reality or virtual reality technologies.