LG Display begins production of Tandem OLED for notebooks

LG Display said on Monday that it has developed and started production of a 13-inch Tandem OLED Panel aimed at notebooks.

Tandem OLED is the same technology Apple introduced on tablets for the first time in their latest iPad Pro models unveiled last month. LG Display is the main supplier of the panels for those tablets.

A Tandem OLED panel has two red, green, and blue (RGB) emissive layers, or the layers that emit light, in contrast to existing OLED panels on smartphones which have one emissive layer.

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This allows the panel to offer higher brightness with a longer lifespan. Because of these qualities, LG Display was the first to introduce the technology in 2019 for panels in automobiles, which require more durable and longer-lasting screens than those used in consumer products.

The company also becomes the first to introduce Tandem OLED to notebooks with the new the panel. LG Display said its latest 13-inch Tandem OLED panel offers double the lifespan and three times the brightness of existing OLED panels in the notebook space.

Also: What iPad Pro’s Tandem OLED tells us about future device screens

The South Korean display maker said that power consumption has also been lowered by 40%, making the panel optimal for AI notebooks and other high-performance devices.

According to LG Display, the panel, also a touchscreen, also went through design and component improvements to be around 40% thinner and 28% lighter than previous panels, making it optimal for premium notebooks to offer slim designs. It also offers a WQXGA+ (2880×1800) ultra-high resolution and 100% of the DCI-P3 color range as well as meets Vesa’s Display HDR True Black 500 high dynamic range to offer deep blacks, the company added.

Display makers like LG Display and Samsung Display are looking for new growth areas besides smartphones and are actively seeking to expand OLED panel supply to notebooks and tablets. With Apple applying OLED to its iPads for the first time, it will almost certainly want to use them on MacBooks as well in the future. This means its suppliers LG Display and Samsung Display will want to accumulate more experience and expertise on OLED panels for notebooks before their main customer Cupertino, eventually give them the orders.