A brighter future

Konica Minolta and General Electric have signed a strategic alliance agreement to accelerate the development and commercialisation of OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode) devices for lighting applications. Their goal is to bring OLED lighting to market within the next 3 years.

OLEDs are thin, organic materials sandwiched between two electrodes, which illuminate when an electrical charge is applied. They have the potential to deliver improved levels of efficiency and performance, while achieving at least the same quality of illumination found in traditional products in the marketplace today.

In 2006, KM announced that it had successfully developed a white OLED with a world record power efficiency of 64 lumens per watt at 1,000 candela per square metre—a brightness which is appropriate for lighting applications. Prior to this development, KM developed its own highly efficient and long-life blue phosphorescent materials. Applying these material technologies, along with multi-layer design technology and innovative optical design technology, KM succeeded in developing an OLED having a practical light emission level of approximately 10,000 hours.