Fraunhofer Institute for Photonic Microsystems IPMS will show two new project results during the Plastic Electronics Asia 2009 exhibition that will be held on June 8-10 in Taipei (Taiwan).
The two project results were realized inside the German OLED research association CARO which stands for “Car OLED” that indicates the focus of this research and development project with target of developing highly efficient and highly reliable OLED devices for customer specific automotive applications.
Two project partners of the CARO project partners, Optrex Europe GmbH and Fraunhofer IPMS, along with the styling-studio Pollmann GmbH, recently developed a study based on a commercial steering-wheel with a car manufacturer neutral functional representation. In the center of this steering-wheel a white-emitting circular OLED signage device is integrated.
In vehicles today, liquid crystal displays (LCDs) are widely used in the instrument cluster, the central infotainment, and the climate control unit. The study of the CARO partners and the company Pollmann GmbH represents a potentially new area of application for displays.
In nearly every vehicle the emblem of the corresponding car manufacturer is integrated in the central position of the steering-wheel. Here an OLED display opens up a variety of new ideas and concepts for interior designers. Due to the thin construction depth of OLED displays the integration of other components into the steering-wheel will not be influenced, in particular for the airbag enough installation space will be remaining, of instance under the display.
In addition, OLEDs have the advantage that they potentially could be completely built on the basis of plastics. Already by opening the car doors the OLED could be activated and light up the emblem of the car manufacturer. Is the ignition switched on the emblem will be dimmed or completely switched off. Furthermore the display could be used to show warning instructions during the drive or take over further functions of today’s instrument clusters.
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