Are Paper-Thin OLED Screens the Future of Smartphone Displays?
There aren’t many industries or technologies that move as fast as smartphones. Since the launch of the Apple iPhone in 2007, many of the world’s leading electronics manufacturers have been racing to produce the next ‘must-have’ mobile device. As an offshoot of that, we now also have a wide variety of tablet PCs on the market (led, unsurprisingly, by Apple’s iPad). All of these devices offer us web access at our fingertips – making it easy to message friends or even find the best credit card rate within just a few swipes.
As with many other areas of technology, the form factor of smartphones is changing all the time. More specifically, the phones being released seem to be getting larger screens and thinner overall shapes. All you have to do is compare an iPhone 3G to the Samsung Galaxy S II to see the difference and progression. With this evolution in mind, it’s no surprise that screen manufacturers are working tooth and nail to create displays that are as thin as possible while maximising screen inches. One technology that falls straight into that category is flexible OLED screens – but are they the way of the future? Will we really be folding our phone into our pockets one day?
What is flexible OLED technology?
Let’s start at the beginning: what OLED technology actually is. The term stands for Organic Light Emitting Diode. More specifically to smartphones, the tech we’re discussing here is known as FOLED (Flexible Organic Light Emitting Diode). OLED technology works in a very unique way. Imagine a single screen as a thin sheet of plastic. Within this sheet are multiple layers of material, each of which perform a different task. The two most important layers are the organic polymer layers, usually a form of plastic. One is conductive and one is emissive. With a current passed through them, light can be generated.
This structure sits on top of what’s known as a substrate – essentially a base for all of the layers, in our case plastic. Because the layers are organic materials that respond in a different way to electric current, they can be made very thin. Unlike traditional displays which rely on pixels, and thus components, OLED can be practically razor thin. So where does the flexible part come in? Well, because of the way in which the screens work (layers of organic polymer), they can be bent and flexed without any of the ‘components’ becoming damaged. In a nutshell, their organic construction makes them as flexible as human skin (and less easy to break).
When will smartphones start using FOLED?
The current frontrunner in the race to create the first smartphone with a flexible screen is Samsung. At CES 2011 the manufacturer were showing off their latest developments with FOLED screens, and news from that event seems to suggest that Samsung is planning on launching the world’s first FOLED smartphone at some point on 2012. Presumably other phone manufacturers will follow suit, assuming the product is a success. At present it seems that Samsung are making themselves somewhat of a guinea pig for this technology – and the success or failure of it will mean a lot to them. The biggest indicator of success for the technology will likely be when companies like Apple start to adapt it to their products.
Potential FOLED pitfalls
The only issue right now is a question that many are asking: how will a flexible screen make a smartphone better? There’s no denying that the technology is innovative and great to look at, but how practical is it in real terms? This will depend on what the phone manufacurers do with it. As far as what Samsung are doing with FOLED tech, they seem to simply be showing concept pieces rather than actual phones. They bend them and even hammer them to show how durable the screens are, but they’ve not yet shown what the benefit to the consumer will be – other than the aesthetic appeal. Who knows? Maybe Samsung or another smartphone maker will be able to create something truly original and useful. All we can do for the time being is wait, watch, and hope that one day we’ll all have paper thin phones that can – quite literally – be folded away in to our pockets.
Microsoft Surface Is Finally Coming In To Land
System rebranded as the Samsung SUR40
Following its initial and somewhat inauspicious launch the second generation of the iconic touch screen computer system, the Microsoft surface has finally arrived at some of its customers. The system has undergone a fairly major technological overhaul and has been relabelled the Samsung SUR40. A renaming that would suggest that the Microsoft corporation are taking a step backward from the device and perhaps distancing themselves from a product which has had more than a few glitches through its development. It is almost certain that if they are looking to sell mobile phones this device will not be the way forward.
Is small better?
The question of size is an important one. When we as consumers look at space, memory, storage capacity, pixels we are constantly fed the reality that ‘big is better’, which is generally true. The lack of success experienced in the number of units shifted of the originally Microsoft surface would indicate that on the issue of size there are some areas where small is most definitely better. The one key factor that, as consumers, we are all aiming to keep as low as possible is that of price. (Within reason of course). You do have to pay for quality and customers do not mind some investment if there is a return in terms of the optimum specifications. The same does not work for actual physical size, at least not when it comes to a computer system. In the case of a LED television system, where the bigger the screen the better the experience, consumers may head for the top end of the scale, but as a personal computer system the consumer has not seen the need for 40” of touch screen, or at least if the Surface example is anything to go by, not yet.
Poignant Juxtaposition between Microsoft and Apple
There is a fairly poignant juxtaposition with the Apple product that Microsoft is desperate not to give up market share to here. This exists on several different levels. Unlike the hugely popular apple multi touch surface devices; the iPad and the iPhone the Samsung SUR40 is big; some 40” from corner to corner as the name suggests, and as such a lot less mobile than apples portable devices at between 2 ½” and 10”. And whereas the consumers have flocked in their droves to greet the launch of these miniature marvels, and gladly handed over an enormous fortune to Apple in the process, it is not the same story for the Microsoft Samsung Surface.
The surface customers are a small and less fanatical breed. Individually they have handed over a relative fortune for their devices; up to as much as $12,000 for any individual unit, (a mere $8000 if you are willing to buy the system with nothing to stand it on). Conversely the surface has not gained Microsoft or Samsung any huge share of the market and there must be some very real questions over the cost effectiveness of such a device which in terms of research and development for both companies must be occupying a considerable amount of funding when in the market place there seems very limited appeal.
Questionable business model
You have got to say in terms of business model when the company that gave the world the personal computer system, and effectively revolutionized the world that we live in, looked at the business model for the surface and thought, “Hey here is a super cool, super expensive, super huge computer system, that is completely opposite to the system that brought us a fortune, lets invest a fortune in that!” They were having a bit of an off day. Sure, it is gorgeous, and as a technological innovation it is a very desirable product. It does fit well in the business locations that have chosen to purchase units like the banks and businesses which will be showcasing the device, but for most people it is just an enormous, oversized, immovable iPad. And why would you want to pay $12,000 when you can purchase something like the Kindle Fire for $200, which when you can carry about to show all your friends and relatives.
How Smartphones Will Change Business
Smartphones are just that. They’re smart. In turn, the way people use them is smart. It wasn’t long ago that our phones didn’t offer email, Internet connectivity and directions to our next meeting. Then again, that much time hasn’t passed since we didn’t have phones if we left our houses.
These days, smartphones have become a part of who we are. They’ve changed the way we do business, the way we communicate, and the way we live our lives. In fact, in a poll done by RingCentral in which they asked small- to medium-sized smartphone-using business owners across the United States what the one thing they couldn’t live without. Around 40 percent said their smartphones. It’s important to know that an equal 40 percent said they couldn’t live without “having an intimate relationship.” Yes, you read that right. Smartphone users are just as addicted to their phones as they are with human relationships.
Additionally, 77 percent of business owners said they use their smartphones as their primary way to conduct business, as opposed to a small 22 percent who said they use their office phones. These facts, among so many others, prove that smartphones have already changed the way we work. The following are a few more ways that smartphones have infiltrated into our business, as well as ways they’ll continue to change business in the future.
- Ultra-Accessibility – Before there was email, you reached people by phone. Before there were phones, you wrote letters or met with people face-to-face. Today, you can meet people virtually face to face over the Internet, while on your phone and at the airport. Being accessible to work 24 hours a day, 7 days per week has become the norm. People, especially business owners, are expected to be available all the time – and they have the technology to do so.Smartphones means that businesspeople have access to email and work-related documents wherever they are, so they are not only able to do work all the time, but they are expected to. The majority of business is done on the go, making business more competitive and making competition in all fields more fierce. How can you tell your boss you aren’t going to work on the weekend when your competitor does? Smartphones give employees the feeling of freedom (“Sure, you can go to your sister’s house for the weekend”), while taking it away from them at the same time (“but don’t forget your smartphone, we’re going to need you on call”).What’s more is that the more accessible we become, the faster we expect items to be complete, and the faster we want our business to run. This need for speed isn’t going away – it will continue to grow faster, making future generations quicker, more efficient, and all together smarter.
- No Limits –Smartphones will continue to break the current barriers of business, as they’ve already begun to do. Need to have a face-to-face training seminar with employees in Japan? No problem. Smartphones allow us to visually see clients who live in different countries on different continents and in whole different cultures. The former barriers of limited communication are solved by the unlimited data plans that you purchase with your smartphone. Phones will continue to impress us with their capabilities and doing business will continue to get easier, no matter who your clients are.Additionally, as the smartphone market continues to expand with cell phone providers and manufacturers, the prices of these devices continue to drop on a monthly, if not weekly, basis. This means that more people can afford to buy smartphones, which ultimately means that any limits you may have found in the past with employees or other business not being able to afford the technology are soon going to be nonexistent. “Regular” cell phones (also known as phones that don’t have an Internet browser) will become obsolete. Future generations will not remember what it was like to only use their phones to talk to people. It will be all business all the time – and it will be normal to do so. There truly will be no limits to how, when, and where people use their phones to get the job done.
- Less Office Space – Because smartphones can be used from anywhere by anyone, we will see more business working at remote locations and not gathering in offices. Already, there has been a large rise in the amount of business owners who work out of their homes and connect to employees via technology, but this will continue to increase. Although there are obvious benefits to sharing offices with your coworkers and employees, offices also come with a huge expense to the company. By not having to pay to lease out offices or pay for your top employees to relocate geographically to where you are planning to have your business, the opportunity for new business to start rises.We’ll continue to see start-up businesses that have their employees all over the world. Employees may work at their homes or in various locations or smaller offices that a few people gather at when needed. They’ll rely upon smartphones and other technologies to keep their organization together and to keep communication at an all-time high.
Smartphones will give business owners a way to keep cost down while running successful organizations, which further promotes entrepreneurship. They can have video chats online with employees, and even pay for their employees’ smartphones as part of their incentives to join the organization. This way, people feel like they are getting the best of both worlds – a job with a small sense of freedom from having to punch in at an office for nine hours per day. Unfortunately for owners of buildings with office space for lease, this will mean a rise in vacancies that will need to be filled in order to pay the bills.
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