According to a recent leak to the Wall Street Journal, Sony will instead refocus their attention to producing more LCD TVs, particularly the budget entry level market.

Sony was the first company to launch a commercial OLED TV with the $2,500(!) 11 inch XEL-1 in 2007, instigating the popularity of OLED prototypes at electronic trade shows.

The Wall Street Journal speculated that this move may give rivals Samsung and LG more time to release their own lower priced OLED HDTVs. In fact, LG have already announced that they have a 15 inch OLED TV in production which is due for release in December this year, with 32 inch OLED TVs available by 2012.

The 55 inch TVs are said by LG to have been “designed specifically to target the high-end segment and offer unmatched quality and design” – and at only 24.8mm thick they certainly got the design aspect spot on. LG hope to extend the LED TV sizes available by releasing the slightly thicker in design 4inch 2 and 47 inch LED models by the end of the year.

Working on the prediction that 5 million LED TVs will be sold in 2010, LG are expecting that as much as 40% of the current LCD TV market will shift to LED by 2011.

Simon Kang, the LG Electronics Home Entertainment Company President and CEO said “These new models will change the LED LCD TV market landscape and we expect these devices to reinforce the premium image of LCD TVs in general.”

Source: Home Cinema Choice

It is predicted that by 2013 the LED sales will account for a considerable 39% of all LCD TVs sold. There used to be a significant price difference between LED and traditional CCFL (cold cathode fluorescent lamps) lit televisions, but it is believed the price burden is expected to drop and analysts are expecting that the next wave of LED LCD TV models will be significantly cheaper than current offerings.

Improved refresh rates with LCD TV screens are also contributing to booming rates according to rival research company DisplaySearch, apparently screens offering double and quadruple frame rates will top the 22.5 million mark this year.

The latest technology that is appearing on the consumer TV market is the OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diodes). Conventional LEDs are familiar to everyone from the early red LED displays in calculators and watches in the 70’s, to the wide range of colours that can now be found in torches, car lights – the Audi A5 and Audi R8 are an example and the back lights in LCD TVs.

An OLED TV display is actually closer to a traditional CRT based screen than a LCD or Plasma display, as OLED’s have a triad of three red green and blue colored dots and these are laid down as the film of organic compounds.

OLEDS have many advantages compared to other thin screen technology and as they don’t need a power hungry back light, OLEDs can be made very thin and even can be produced on flexible and roll up forms. The lack of a backlight also means that OLEDs consume much less power than a LCD or plasma display. 

OLED based displays enable a greater range of color gamut, brightness, and viewing angle than LCDs because OLED pixels directly emit light. OLED pixel colors appear correct and unshifted, even as the viewing angle approaches 90 degrees from normal. LCDs use a backlight and cannot show true black, while an “off” OLED element produces no light and consumes no power. Energy is also wasted in LCDs because they require polarisers which filter out about half of the light emitted by the backlight.

OLEDs also have a faster response time than standard LCD screens. Whereas a standard LCD currently has an average of a 4-8 millisecond response time, an OLED can have less than 0.01ms response time.

Sony is the only manufacturer that has a OLED TV on sale, the Sony XEL-1 which is an 11 inch model on sale in the States and Japan and will be on sale in the UK early next year. Larger OLED TV’s and displays are expected to feature in the CES show in January.

Sony’s goal is to produce a 42inch OLED screen which is probably a year or so off though prototype OLED screens of this size have been shown.