William Gallagher
LG Display is expanding production of its factory lines devoted to Apple, reportedly making low-power LTPO displays that may bring ProMotion to 2021's higher-end "iPhone 13" models.
Following many previous rumors that a 120hz ProMotion iPhone will arrive in 2021, LG Display is reportedly increasing production of the displays that this would require. The company is to produce more OLED panels using low-temperature polycrystalline oxide (LTPO) technology.
According to The Elec, LG is expanding its E6-1 and E6-2 factory lines in Paju, South Korea, in order to produce displays for Apple's 2021 and 2022 iPhones. It's believed that a third factory line, called E6-3, will begin construction once the existing lines have been expanded.
Currently, the company is installing equipment that can produce 5,000 panels per month, and reportedly it aims to eventually produce 25,000 per month. At present, the lines are being expanded to produce panels for the "iPhone 13," but a second round of expansion in May 2021 is believed to be for the "iPhone 14" range in 2022.
Apple has previously used a low-temperature polycrystalline silicon (LTPS) system, but The Elec says it intends to use LTPO specifically for the two higher-end "iPhone 13" models due next year.
Samsung is already using LTPO in the Galaxy Note20 Ultra. The technology's low power consumption means that it can be used to save battery life, but also to deploy features that are more intensive — such as 120Hz ProMotion as seen in the iPad Pro.
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3 Comments
Just out of curiosity, how many phone screens can you make out of those reported 25,000 panels (or substrates as the original article calls them) per month? Surely, we can't be talking only 25,000 smartphone screens per month?
I think it's understandable why we're not seeing these on the iPhone 12. LG simply can't make them yet in the quantities that Apple requires.
Didn’t Samsung supply Apple the displays this year? Than with the amount of 120 HZ LTPO OLED screens Samsung makes I’m sure they could just as easily source them for Apple. Just an assumption. LG’s OLED displays haven’t been of the best quality over the last few years from what I’ve read.