What They Say
A report in the Chosun Biz paper in Korea said that JOLED of Japan is on the verge of bankruptcy because of low yields on its core inkjet OLED panels which are being used by LG, Asus and ViewSonic. The firm had a project to develop an automotive OLED for Lexus, but this project stopped because of slow progress, the report said.
The report suggests that the JOLED technology may be absorbed by TCL CSOT which is planning an inkjet OLED fab in China which uses technology from JOLED.
What We Think
It would not be surprising if this report was true. I haven’t seen detailed data on the shipments from JOLED recently, but it would be amazing if, even with LG promoting the product, it was selling many. The automotive supply chain is notoriously difficult to enter, but it seemed promising for the firm when Denso invested back in 2018. (BR)
Denso showed this flexible OLED at CES in 2019, but wouldn’t say anything about it. Image:Meko
