Forth Dimension Displays Develops 2560 x 1440 FLCOS Microdisplay for Rugged Applications

Forth Dimension Displays Develops 2560 x 1440 FLCOS Microdisplay for Rugged Applications

Breakthrough 0.95-Inch Display using Wide-Temperature Range Ferroelectric Liquid Crystal

Kopin Corporation (NASDAQ: KOPN), a leading provider of innovative wearable computing technologies and solutions, today announced that its wholly-owned subsidiary Forth Dimension Displays (ForthDD) has developed a new WQHD (2560 x 1440 resolution) full-color Ferroelectric Liquid Crystal on Silicon (FLCOS) microdisplay for use in extreme temperature and shock environments. The new display incorporates ForthDD’s proprietary Wide Temperature Range Ferroelectric Liquid Crystal (WTR FLC) material to operate over extended temperature ranges, which enables it to be used in a variety of previously unsupported rugged applications such as automotive, defense and avionics.

“FLCOS displays provide superior fill factor, color purity, and fast switching speeds which produces very high quality imagery, but historically ferroelectric liquid crystals have been restricted to limited temperature range applications,” said Greg Truman, Forth Dimension Displays’ Managing Director. “The breakthrough provided by our WTR FLC performance together with the very high resolution of the our WQHD display allows us to support resolutions that exceed the limits of our Active Matrix Liquid Crystal Displays (AMLCD) and brightness levels that exceed the capability of Organic Light Emitting Diode displays (OLEDs). The innovation provided by our WTR FLC, which has passed environmental and reliability tests, opens up many new applications and markets including high volume US defense product applications.”

The WQHD display with 8.2-micron pixels utilizes ForthDD’s patented Time Domain Imaging (TDI™) technique to produce superior full color imagery and no perceptible motion artifacts. The specialized ultra-fast ForthDD FLCOS overcomes the motion artifacts of standard Liquid Crystal on Silicon (LCOS) displays. The display is generally available as a Board Level Product with fully integrated driver and optional illumination subsystem later in 2020. WQHD displays have now been fully tested and are undergoing system qualification with the first defense customer as a part of fully integrated Kopin display systems, which incorporate the display with Kopin electronics, optics and system packaging elements.

“The availability of the new WQHD display gives us another microdisplay technology in our defense and enterprise product offerings and is ideal for use in systems needing cutting-edge high resolution and bright full color video images without color breakup,” said Bill Maffucci, Kopin’s Vice President/General Manager of Government and Professional Products. “The unique WQHD display is an excellent complement to our AMLCD displays which are primarily for soldier centric systems. As a result, it provides Kopin with the opportunity to open up new markets such as ground vehicle platforms. These market segments have been largely supported by CRT technology and represent a significant potential growth area facilitated by the new WQHD display.”

Forth Dimension Displays’ Wide Temperature Range SXGA microdisplay now shipping

7th September 2017, Scotland – Forth Dimension Displays is shipping this week the first lot of extended temperature range SXGA (1280 x 1024) microdisplays. This marks the successful conclusion of an internal R&D programme to widen the temperature range of the SXGA microdisplay at both, the lower and the upper ends. The introduction of a new ferroelectric liquid crystal (FLC) mixture now enables the microdisplays to be used in additional outdoor and defence applications. The parts shipped this week include the R5 drive boards and will be used in an aircraft head-up display (HUD).

The FLC is a key component in ForthDD’s unique display technology ferroelectric liquid crystal on silicon (FLCOS) allowing electro-optic switching speed of several kHz at low voltage. The new FLC mixture is compatible with other existing and future microdisplays of ForthDD.

Greg Truman, CEO of ForthDD, said “ForthDD is proud to announce our extended temperature range microdisplay. It is quite a challenge for a small manufacturing company to improve in-house one of the key materials, in this case the FLC mixture. Building on this learning curve, we are now capable of performing other FLC material optimisations and to meet tough environmental requirements. Our customers can now pursue a wide range of outdoor and defence applications using the FLCOS display technology. ”