Japan pumps $350 million into the development of 40-inch OLED TVs
Today Japan’s New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization announced it wants to accelerate the commercialization of large-screen OLED-TVs with a $350 million investment to be spent over 5 years.
The public organization plans to cooperate with the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology and a total of 10 Japanese technology companies. These are:
– Hitachi Zosen
– Sony
– Sharp
– Shimadzu
– Toshiba Matsushita Display Technology
– Idemitsu Kosan
– Choshu Industry [JP]
– Sumitomo Chemical
– JSR
– Dainippon Screen
According to Japanese media, the initiative’s goal is to commercialize 40-inch OLED-TVs by 2018. This seems to be surprisingly late, as Samsung showcased a prototype of such a TV as early as 2005.
Sony plans to sell FED-TVs sized at 26 inches through an affiliate company starting next year. The company’s current OLED-TV, the XEL-1, comes with a screen size of 11 inches.