Kopin Corp has announced their entry into the fast growth OLED microdisplay market with first product demonstrations to be shown at CES 2017.
Kopin has developed a novel silicon backplane structure to drive high-speed OLED-on-silicon microdisplays which they believe will give truly immersive VR systems without the size, weight and power constraints of today's direct view products.
Kopin's OLED microdisplay, protected by 10 patents pending, is an ultra high resolution, high speed, low power and small form factor display that delivers a superior user experience for mobile and wearable systems.
OLED-on-silicon microdisplays consist of two key elements: the silicon backplane and the OLED emissive layer.
Kopin's business model is that both the silicon back-plane and emissive layers are outsourced to dedicated foundries, while the design expertise resides within Kopin. It is the first fully fabless OLED microdisplay business model.
Most mobile virtual reality (VR) systems use smartphone-size panels on glass and large optics, resulting in bulky, heavy, power hungry solutions. In addition, the display resolution of the smartphone panels is not sufficient for the large field of view required for VR, resulting in poor image quality with screen door effect.
OLED microdisplays based on Si backplane are much smaller, yet offer higher resolution, and use more compact optics, providing the potential for smaller, lighter, more power efficient VR headset solutions with smooth image and low latency.
Source: Kopin
Dr. John C.C. Fan, Kopin’s CEO and founder, said, "Kopin has been one of the largest and most successful suppliers of microdisplay systems with over 30 million AMLCD and LCOS products shipped." John added, "With the addition of OLED microdisplays and modules to our product portfolio, we now offer our customers a variety of display technologies and optics, enabling our customers to evaluate different designs to create the optimal product of their targeted application."