A demo video by Pixel Qi showing their dual-mode display - LCD and e-paper in one display...

HP announces a new display technology called Electronic Skins. eSkins is a flexible reflective color film, that can alos display icons or alpha-numeric characters.

HP eSkins technology offers brand manufacturers new ways to personalize their products with an electronically controlled color surface created using HP’s breakthrough roll-to-roll manufacturing platform. Designed to make fine-scale circuitry on plastic substrates, the platform processes flexible screens in rolls rather than individual sheets, offering the potential for more cost-effective manufacturing.

This new device architecture is compatible with roll-to-roll plastic circuits that can be combined with proprietary, electrically controllable “inks” to achieve print-like color performance, as well as transparency. Using a technology similar to color printing, HP is developing the capability to produce specific “ink” colors within the PANTONE MATCHING SYSTEM® range. The vibrant, print-quality colors have excellent visibility in direct sunlight and can electronically shift into a transparent state, revealing the surface below the eSkins film.

Amazon announced that the Kindle DX will start shipping on June 10th. It costs 489$, and currently available for pre-order. The Amazon Kindle DX is a wireless e-book reader. It got a large (9.7", 1200x824, at 150 ppi with 16 shades of gray) E Ink display, and Amazon is not just aiming this for books - but also for newspapers (they already signed up the NY Times, Wall street journal, The New Yorker and Time magazine).

Amazon kindle DX

The DX weights 535 grams, and the size is 10.4" x 7.2" x 0.38". It's got 4GB of internal memory (around 3.3Gb of which are available to the user). The modem is a EVDO 1xRTT (Sprint 3G).

Prime View International (PVI) announced that it will acquire E Ink for 215M$. PVI is actually the world's highest volume supplier of ePaper display modules.

This is interesting news. On one hand it might prove useful as we'll have one company that has the E Ink IP and technology, and also manufacturers the displays. On the other hand it might push other display makers into competitive technologies.

Financially speaking, it's probably a disappointed for investors who have given 150M$ to E Ink over the years. Not a very good return on investment...

As part of the release, we learned the E Ink had 18M$ in sales in 1Q 2009, an impressive number.