LG Flexible Display On Its Way - Samsung Bendable Screen Coming Sooner

LG is looking to ramp up the innovation behind their mobile offerings, and the latest announcement from the company is much more promising than putting a "Rear Key" volume rocker on the back of its current flagship smartphone: LG is going to make the first flexible OLED screens for smartphones.

The flexible OLED (organic light emitting diode) display would be a first for smartphones -as it's something only seen so far, for example, on high-end TV sets. The display is built from plastic substrates instead of glass, giving it the otherworldly bendability that recalls futuristic science fiction movies. Still, according to Engadget, the smartphone would likely be fixed inside devices with a curved but ridged design - we're not entering the era of ubiquitous newspaper-like electronic devices quite yet.

"LG Display is launching a new era of flexible displays for smartphones with its industry-leading technology," said Dr. Sang Deog Yeo, Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer of LG Display in LG's release. "The flexible display market is expected to grow quickly as this technology is expected to expand further into diverse applications including automotive displays, tablets and wearable devices. Our goal is to take an early lead in the flexible display market by introducing new products with enhanced performance and differentiated designs next year."

LG promises that the new panel behind the OLEDs will be "bendable and unbreakable." The concave-bent display has a radius of 700mm and is only 0.44mm thick and weighs 7.2 grams with a 6-inch screen. Engadget suggests that the flexible display may be used first in the "G Flex," an LG-made smartphone with a curved screen, which has previously been rumored to be announced this November.

This is the second of LG's big announcements, as far as next-generation smarthphone screens go. The first was a mid-August demonstration of its "Quad IPS" display, a 5.5-inch (non-flexible) screen that features quad 4K HD.

For those not initiated into the cult of 4K, that means the phablet-sized display gets 2560 x 1440p resolution, something you normally only see in ultra-high definition, and ultra-expensive TV screens measuring around 30 inches. Compared to the HTC One's eye-blistering 468 pixels per inch, LG's screen can display 538ppi.

Of course, Samsung, LG's South Korean rival and launch-spoiler, has announced it has plans to introduce a similar curved display on a mobile device before LG does. According to the Reuters' report, Samsung Mobile head of strategic marketing D. J. Lee said at the Galaxy Note 3's launch event, "We plan to introduce a smartphone with a curved display in South Korea in October."

That smartphone is expected to be a special edition of the Galaxy Note 3, but it's similarly not expected to "bend" as much as to sport an unconventionally curved form factor. Its unveil date may be as soon as mid-October. GSM Arena has learned some rumored specs for Samsung's device, including a 5.7-inch display with a respectable resolution (especially for a completely new technology) of 720 x 1280p.

According to Android Authority, the display will be lighter, thinner, and more bendy than LG's flexible panel. The smartphone is expected to run Android 4.3 Jelly Bean and include a quad core processor with 2 GB of RAM and an 8-megapixel camera with dual-LED flash. Here's Samsung announcing their bendable screen at CES 2013 (starts at about 40:00).