Japan Display develops 12.3″ LCD with 87 percent transparency

Japan Display has made a transparent 12.3-inch LCD that allows 87 percent of the light to pass through when the screen is turned off. Due to the technology used, the color reproduction is relatively limited. The screen can display 4096 colors. Mass production will start in the middle of next year.

According to Japan Display, the new transparent 12.3″ LCD is a further development of the 4″ screen it showed in 2017. That screen had a transparency of 80 percent, with the new screen that is 87 percent. The manufacturer uses a technique that does not require polarizers and color filters, but Japan Display does not provide extensive details.

The 12.3″ screen has a wide aspect ratio of 24:9 and a resolution of 1440×540 pixels. That is good for a pixel density of 125ppi. Japan Display will demonstrate the transparent LCD later this week at the Fintech Japan fair. The company says that mass production can start in mid-2020.

Manufacturers of OLED screens have been showing transparent displays for years. LG has demonstrated a number of OLED TVs with transparent screens in recent years. The transparency is about 40 percent when the screen is off. However, the transparent OLED screens do not have a limited color range.

Japan Display also shows a prototype of a small microLED screen. It is a 1.6″ screen with a resolution of 300×300 pixels and a maximum brightness of 3000cd/m2. The company uses an ltps backplane there. Like OLED screens, microLED screens do not have a backlight, polarizer or color filter. Pixels consist of individual micro LEDs.