OLEDs are coming...

Posted by Light Collective

Just attended part of the two day OLED Summit held by OLED insider magazine. Good show by the organisers in terms of being ahead of the game on this topic. Despite costing £900 to be a delegate, it was well attended but with a majority of OLED manufacturers and a smattering of designers (we counted 12 in the audience compared to the 16 on the delegates list).

To be fair, we didn’t attend all of the sessions on both days but the sessions we did see were more than enough to gain an understanding of where we are with this new technology and it seems its not that far down the line actually. Despite a really exciting write up of talks, most of the lectures weren’t as advertised. The OLED developers and manufacturers all said the same thing - similar graphs, similar claims and all with an open ended: ‘The technology is here, its up to you to decide how to use it’ finish. Doug James of Mindseye, Jon Hodges of Jason Bruges Studio, Mark Ridler of BDP, Sam Neuman of Neuman Lighting and Iain Ruxton of Speirs and Major gave the creative side of the coin with presentations about imaginative application. 

Basically OLEDS will be usable, affordable and ready in 5-10 years (depending on who you are talking to) but no-ones quite sure what to do with them - they all insist they offer new ways to light spaces but didn’t really have much to show. The really exciting stuff: flexible OLEDS seem to be stumping everyone bar GE who had a sample on show. Iain Ruxton made an excellent point about it being a technology that is purely usable for decorative applications and not much else, at least for the next 3-5 years.  It therefore begs the question why everyone is so desperate to pigeon hole OLEDS as a replacement technology for something, anything….

If you want some useful, current and crucial information about the future of the lighting profession, attend the modestly priced ‘From Zero to Hero’ conference jointly organised by PLDA and ILE on 14th July. Pitched at 1/9th of the price of the OLED conference, it will cover the EU consideration for Lighting Design Legislation, Designer Competency, Green Public Procurement, EuP Directive, Carbon Reduction Commitment, Energy Labelling Directive, Market Surveillance, Carbon Calculators and Ultra Efficient Lighting. 

Visit http://www.ile.org.uk/ for line up of speakers and registration for the event.

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