E Ink - Page 33

Update: The investment will total $700 million (!), and the new plant will go online in 2013/2014.

Russia's RUSNANO (Russian Corporation of Nanotechnologies) announced a 'major' investment in Plastic Logic. Plastic Logic will create their second volume production facility (for next-generation plastic displays) in Russia. Those displays are based on E Ink, and are thin, lightweight and flexible.

Interestingly, Plastic Logic says that those displays will be used in Plastic Logic's first consumer electronics product, a next-generation electronic reader for business that is currently under development. The Que E-reader was canceled back in August, so it's good to know they are working on a new reader.

A few months ago we reported that Hanvon is working on an e-reader with a color E Ink display. It was said to launch by the end of 2010. Now we hear that Hanvon has delayed the reader to March 2011. It will have a large display (10"), launch in China only (at least initially) and will cost around $440. This will most likely be the first color E Ink product...

E Ink holdings reported net profit of $22.2 million in the third quarter of 2010 - a company record. Revenues were $171 million, the same as the second quarter. The company's margin are down - because e-paper panel prices have dropped recently.

According to E Ink, Amazon expects record e-reader shipments in the fourth quarter, and E Ink is expanding its capacity to meet clients' demand.

Phosphor has released a new E Ink watch - the World Time Curved, and we got one to review. The watch has got a "surf" (segmented) E Ink display that offers 24 time zones, several displays zones. The display is very similar to Phosphor's Digital-Hour watches (here's our review of those) - in fact E Ink tells us it's pretty much the same display. The new watch is thinner, though, at 9.3mm (you hardly notice this, to be fair).

The watch costs $150 and is now shipping from Phosphor's own shop (hopefully it'll arrive in Amazon.com soon as well). The Digital Hour watch is still available for 195$ - so the new watch is actually quite cheaper.

Chi Lin Technology (a subsidiary of the Chi Mei Group) has launched new e-tag products that use E Ink displays. The company has already start producing those e-tags, which range from 1.5" to 7" in size.

Chi Lin is also collaborating with Seiko-Epson to produce E Ink displays for e-readers and commercial applications.

A couple of days ago we reported about a prototype flexible e-paper display that Sony demonstrated. It turns out that this wasn't actually made by Sony - it was simply loaned to them by E Ink. Sony has no current plans to commercialize such technology and use them an a product.

Remember Seiko's Active-Matrix E ink watch? now we hear that it'll be available by the end of 2010, and the price will be 'reasonable'. The E Ink offers 80,000 pixels (at 300dpi) and 4 gray levels. It supports synchronization via radio (from the nearest atomic clock), solar cells and a 180-degree viewing angle.

E Ink says that although Samsung was a client, its decision to withdraw from the EPD business will not effect the company significantly - Samsung was a small client, apparently.

Samsung 10.1-inch color e-paper prototype

LG Display plans to begin mass production of color 9.7" e-paper panels, and 19" flexible monochrome ones (most likely both are based on E Ink). We don't know LG's plan for the displays, but we can assume they're targeting e-readers, and perhaps newspaper-sized ones, too (for the 19" flexible panels).

LG has unveiled their 19" flexible E Ink panels back in January (shown above). The panels are only 0.3mm thick, and weight just 130 grams. It uses metal foil, and so it can recover its original shape after being bent.

Geek.com has posted an interesting comparison: comparing the iPad's IPS-LCD (or Super-LCD) to the Kindle's E Ink up close. There are two photos. One at 26x magnification, in which you can already see the 'dots' in the LCD (the right image):

The second image is at 400x magnification:

As you can see, the E Ink display is way better up close - it's not just a series of dots. So obviously the LCD has a lot of advantages (color, fast response time, bright), but for reading, nothing beats an EPD...