AUO

AUO collaborated with Sony Honda Mobility and demonstrated a microLED "media bar" mounted on the exterior f Sony Honda's AFEELA 1 car, at CES 2025. AUO says that this is a groundbreaking application that connects the cockpit to the world outside the vehicle, inspiring innovative car designs. 

This is indeed the first application of Micro LED displays on a vehicle’s exterior. The two companies explain that the Media Bar can be used to show a diverse range of information, including charging status and vehicle details with unobstructed visibility. Vehicle occupants could engage with the outside world from within the cockpit by displaying personalized content on the media bar, such as videos, pictures, and unique messages.

AUO is showcasing its latest microLED technologies at CES 2025, focusing on automotive solutions, under the Smart Cockpit 2025 platform. The company is demonstrating several novel applications, enabled by the transparent and flexibility of microLED displays.

So first up we have the Virtual Sky Canopy, and XR Interactive Window technology - both of these adopt the use of tiled transparent microLED displays to embed within the car windows and windows, and extend the display beyond the normal instrument cluster and information displays.

Last month OTFT developer Smartkem announced that it has partnered with AUO to jointly develop rollable transparent microLED displays, based on Smartkem's OTFT backplane technology. The project will be based on a novel OTFT production process developed at ITRI. 

Smartkem announced today that it was granted $1.1 million from the Innovate UK fund to support this project. This funding is part of the 2024 UK-Taiwan Collaborative R&D Initiative. The funding will be paid over the period of the two-year project, starting in early 2025.

UK-based OTFT developer Smartkem announced that it has partnered with AUO to jointly develop rollable transparent microLED displays, based on Smartkem's OTFT backplane technology. The project will be based on a novel OTFT production process developed at ITRI.

Smartkem believes its technology will not only enable high-end rollable transparent microLED displays, but it will also enable drastic cost reduction that will bring costs down to mass market prices. Smartkem's low-temperature processing enables the use of low-cost and flexible plastic substrates rather than glass, which the company says will be a decisive factor in bringing production costs down.

During the company's recent conference call, AUO said that the company is "making significant progress" in MicroLED technology, transitioning to a 4.5-Gen line. AUO's current microLED production line is referred to as a 1-Gen line, used to produce commercial wearable displays (although we understand yields are very low and production costs are still extremely high). The company hopes its new larger line will improve production efficiency and cost structure.

AUO said that the new production line will enable it to start producing automotive displays, which are expected to launch by 2026 or 2027.

The microLED display technology is highly promising, as these displays offer increased brightness, efficiency and lifetime over the current LCD and OLED displays. However adoption of microLED displays in the major display markets is still years away. One display segment that could see adoption of microLED display sooner, is the transparent display sector.

Transparent displays are very interesting and have been researched for many years - and we have seen commercial adoption of transparent LCD, LED and OLED displays. These never achieved meaningful market success, but microLED developers hope that once microLED transparent displays are available this could change, thanks to the higher transparency and brightness offered by microLEDs compared to OLEDs and LCDs.

In recent years, we have seen many companies demonstrating transparent microLED prototypes, and even deploying some solution commercially. We will detail some of these recent advances below.

During the company's recent conference call, AUO said that the company is undergoing a strategic transformation, focusing on mobility solutions, vertical solutions, and the display segment. The company gave several interesting statements regarding its microLED project and investments.

First of all, the company says that microLED is a priority for the company, and it plans to allocate more resources into its microLED projects. AUO says that its microLED technology is 'gaining traction', and that it is producing microLED displays commercially, but it did not detail more. The company believes it is the leader in microLED development.

According to reports from Korea and Taiwan, both Samsung Display and LG Display have decided to slow down their microLED business plans. The main reasons behind this are the high production costs of microLEDs and high competition which is seen to lead to low profitability. 

Samsung Display will continue to invest in microLED R&D, but has delayed plans to expand production. LG Display has already reduced the size of its microLED R&D teams and is looking into deploying some of its microLED developers into the OLED side of its business.

Trendforce estimates that the microLED market is set for fast growth in the near future, as companies continue to invest in large display applications, wearable products (mainly AUO) and AR and automotive applications. Trendforce says that microLED chip sales will increase from around $62 million in 2024 to $580 million by 2028 (a CAGR of 84% from 2023 to 2028).

Trendforce acknowledges that the inability to reduce costs and technical challenges are major factors behind the cancellation of Apple’s Micro LED watch project, and so continuous optimization of production processes remains critical for the development of the Micro LED industry. 

AUO had an impressive booth at Displayweek, showing some of its latest microLED prototypes. It is clear that the company is highly focused on microLED technology as its next-gen display strategy.

First up, with a 31" large area single-panel microLED, which AUO says is the world's largest. The display is produced on a single glass LTPS backplane, and offers 120Hz and a brightness of 500 nits. AUO calls this a Large Size A.R.T. MicroLED display.