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Konica Minolta Pioneer OLED Offering Flexible OLED Lighting Panels for High End Automotive Taillights
September 11, 2017
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Pioneer has developed bendable OLED lighting for cars that is bright, malleable and long lasting. The lighting can be customized in terms of color, brightness and other factors to meet the design needs of automakers. The lifespan of 10 years is double that of the typical product, paving the way for use in higher-end vehicles. Pioneer intends to transfer the technology to Konica Minolta Pioneer OLED, a joint venture for OLED lighting that it set up with Konica Minolta in June. It expects this company to have a practical version of the technology ready in 2020, but in the interim, Pioneer has begun demonstrating the lighting to automakers in Europe, Japan and China. Pioneer anticipates strong demand for the bendable OLED lighting for use in luxury cars. Taillights of self-driving cars are another potential application as automakers look for novel design features. Some cars have already begun to incorporate OLED lighting, but the glass substrates of these products make them more difficult to design with curved shapes. Pioneer has been developing OLED lighting on resin substrates than can be bent, and its latest product resolves the problem of longevity. Pioneer solved the encapsulation problem by modifying the materials used for the resin substrate and the OLED elements to counteract the damaging effects of water. Pioneer and Konica Minolta merged their OLED lighting businesses in a 50-50 joint venture. Konica Minolta Pioneer OLED is using technologies provided by both parents to quickly establish a presence in a variety of sectors, including cars, medicine and advertising.