14 DAY TRIAL // 2006 was a pretty rough year for Sony but finally business results were pretty good. We all know that they are not very good at making choices but this time they finally got it right. Blu-Ray, after a bad start, is beginning to look better and standalone units are getting cheaper. Of course, Sony is constantly trying to improve its business (and its image) but that doesn't happen all the time.
For 2007, the first trend that Sony will follow seems to be OLED panel production. At the Consumer Electronics Show this week Sony showcased a 27-inch flat panel OLED which features an impressive contrast ratio of over 1,000,000:1 (plasmas beware!) and 1080p resolution. The panel is also said to have >100% NTSC color reproduction.
Rumors about a possible mass production of Sony OLEDs have been steadily appearing on websites, but Sony officials didn't say whether they are planning to enter mass production with these organic LED panels or not. However, they remain interested in this technology, motive for which they have produced several samples of monitors which use OLEDs.
The OLED display technology recently suffered some big hits. RiData - who was a major small OLED screen manufacturer - announced that they will exit the manufacturing business last month. As for LG.Philips they have only showcased some small models that are being built in collaboration with Eastman Kodak. SED (or surface-conduction electron-emitted) is also swimming against the current with Toshiba announcing several delays for its first SED TV. All this being taken into account, I don't think that we'll see SED/OLED panels in mass production before 2009.