‘Release of LG’s rollable OLED TV may have been delayed again due to low yields’

The release of the rollable 65-inch OLED TV from LG, which was shown again at CES at the beginning of this year, may be delayed again. According to the Korean news medium The Elec, this is related to low yields due to the fragility of the thin glasses. substrates.

The Elec reports that industry sources indicate that LG Display uses very thin glass substrates, less than 0.2mm thick, for its roll-up panels. This not only means that the yields have fallen, the fragility of the substrates is also a problem. As a solution, LG Display is reportedly trying to add a flexible plastic coating instead of glass. These are polyimide substrates. This could make the panels lighter and more flexible, but also more sensitive to scratches.

LG announced at the beginning of this year that the rollable OLED TV will be released this summer. This RX is a 65-inch OLED TV that closely resembles the R9 television, the rollable 65-inch OLED TV that LG showed at CES 2019. However, the R9 never appeared on the market. It could be that the RX is an almost identical version of the R9, with only updated software. The RX television should cost sixty thousand euros. LG also showed a rollable screen at this year’s CES that does not roll up like the RX, but from top to bottom.

Sharp also showed a prototype of a rollable OLED TV in November last year. This is a relatively small television with a diagonal of 30″. In contrast to the LG Display panels, this is an OLED panel based on RGB subpixels, but no production version of this television has yet been released.

Prototypes of flexible OLED screens have been around for years, but releasing a rollable OLED TV is not very easy, because it is quite a challenge to prevent the screen from being damaged while rolling.

LG showed the RX-oled TV at the beginning of this year at CES