CDT Announces New Long-Life Light-Emitting Polymers

Cambridge Display Technologies recently announced two breakthroughs in the development of long-lifetime, high-efficiency light-emitting polymers for full-color, video-capable displays. CDT, a pioneer in the area of polymer OLEDs (PLEDs), recently developed a red phosphorescent device and a blue fluorescent device that each achieves record lifetimes.  

The red device is the result of collaboration between CDT and Sumitomo Chemical and has  a lifetime of half a million hours, with an initial luminance of 100cd/m². The efficiency is also improved at 7cd/A. Red efficiency is especially important as this color consumes the largest share of power input in a color device, so improvements in red efficiency have important practical implications, according to a CDT press release.

The blue device has a lifetime of 150,000 hours, up from the 30,000-hour lifetime of a blue device CDT released just 18 months ago. The newer blue device also has the highest recorded efficiency for a blue polyfluorene material, at 10cd/A. The new blue material yields very good color values and efficiency. The OLED industry has come to regard progress on blue materials as a key indicator, the press release stated, since this performance dictates the range of full-color applications that can be implemented. This announcement gives a strong indication that the technology is moving rapidly to satisfy the requirements for applications, including large display screens.