Plextronics, Novaled to develop organic lighting technology

PITTSBURGH, USA & DRESDEN, GERMANY: Novaled AG, a leader in energy saving and long living OLEDs (Organic Light Emitting Diodes), and Plextronics, Inc., an international company that specializes in conductive organic inks for printed lighting, solar and other electronics, announced that they have agreed to jointly develop doped and solution processed organic materials for OLED applications.

OLED technology is expected to become a major ingredient of flat displays and drive a new era lighting innovation with its flexible design and energy efficiency advantages.

The collaboration agreement specifies that the companies will combine their respective technologies to develop an advanced solution processible Hole Injection Layer (HIL) technology for OLEDs.

By leveraging Plextronics’ organic conductive ink technology and Novaled’s organic dopant technology, the companies will target these advanced HIL materials for use with solution processed polymer and small molecule emitters, as well as with vacuum deposited small molecule emitters.

Novaled and Plextronics aim to offer a solution processed HIL with the same performance as a Novaled doped small molecule HIL deposited in a vacuum process. The Novaled doped HIL is part of the Novaled PIN OLED technology, which has demonstrated some of the highest power efficiency together with a long lifetime.

Plextronics and Novaled will co-market Plexcore OC inks that incorporate Novaled dopant materials.

“Novaled is well-known for its power efficient OLED technology and is considered to be a world leading supplier of doping material,” says Andrew Hannah, President and CEO of Plextronics. “We expect that the combination of Plextronics’ conductive ink for OLED -- Plexcore OC -- and Novaled’s doping technologies will enable the high performance printing of OLED devices.”

“Plextronics is an international leader in organic ink”, adds Gildas Sorin, CEO of Novaled. “It is Novaled’s strategy to partner with key industry players, like Plextronics, in order to enlarge our business offering for customers. Together with Plextronics, we are able to introduce the Novaled PIN OLED technology to the world of printed electronics.”

Novaled's large area OLED device fulfills lighting specs

DRESDEN, GERMANY: Novaled developed a 15x15 cm white OLED device with a thickness of less than 2 mm. Die Struktur der OLED stack allows for a natural and warm white light performing a very high color rendering index (CRI) of 90.

The perception of this light is similar to sunlight or what is delivered by incandescent bulbs. The achieved color coordinates of (0.44, 0.41) are inside the US Department of Energy (DoE) quadrangles at Illuminant A and even meet the more restrictive 7step MacAdams Ellispis around Illuminant A.

With this large area flat light element OLEDs will enable a pleasant illumination of the room together with revolutionary design. By reaching 30 lm/W on a 15x15 cm area Novaled achieved an intermediate step in line with the European project OLED100.

The specific electrode structure Novaled developed and now commercializes under the name ‘liternity’ increases the device lifetime. Using the liternity technology the 15x15 OLED device can reach a lifetime of 20,000 h. Liternity OLEDs maintain the appearance of a homogeneously lighted-up surface over the entire life span of the OLED.

Long lifetimes will be crucial to reduce maintenance cycles for commercial applications. The liternity technology will allow the upscaling towards very large OLED panel sizes.

“Novaled is using its leadership on power efficiency and long lifetime to pave the way for large and thin lighting products which the market is expecting from OLED,” says Gildas Sorin, CEO of Novaled AG.

“The performance of this 15x15 OLED element perfectly illustrates the potential of both: Novaled PIN OLED and liternity technology. It reflects as well our company is dealing with the market requests and various aspects of a lighting product going beyond the OLED stack and materials.“