Samsung Display is set to acquire US-based eMagin for $218 million. The acquisition is due to be completed in H2 2023. eMagin serves customers in the industrial, defense, consumer electronics, and medical sectors and made 30.5 million USD in revenue last year. The company recently unveiled a micro-OLED with a resolution of 1920 x 1200 pixels and a luminance of 15,000 cd/m². eMagin’s RGB OLED emitters are applied in its own patented printing process, the Direct Patterned Display (dPd), which doesn’t require fine metal masks (FMM).
Samsung’s President, Joo Sun Choi, sees the potential for micro-OLEDs in mixed reality (MR) displays. Micro-OLEDs have a high pixel density of several thousand dpi, are energy-efficient, and recommended for AR/MR and VR glasses. They’re also conducive to lightweight designs, critical for AR/MR and VR glasses’ everyday use.
Micro-OLEDs are in competition with micro-LEDs, the inorganic variant. While micro-OLEDs have been mass-produced for years, micro- and nano-LEDs are still in development, thus providing a considerable advantage for micro-OLEDs. With the acquisition of eMagin, Samsung has a head start over its rivals in the MR product market, including Apple.
Apple is reportedly working on its own micro-LED headset and intends to launch it later this year. Samsung Electronic is already developing an AR/VR headset, suggesting that marketing such headsets will be a close competition between the tech giants.
