Sony develops film-thin display

TOKYO - In the race for ever thinner displays for TVs, cell phones and other gadgets, Sony may have developed one to beat them all — a razor-thin display that bends like paper while showing full-color video.

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Sony Corp (NYSE:SNE - news). posted video of the new display on its Web page Friday. The display is being held up by a hand that's squeezing the 0.3 millimeter, or 0.01 inch, display, while showing color video of a bicyclist stuntman, picturesque lake and other images.

Sony will present the research and video at an academic symposium in Long Beach, California, for the Society for Information Display this week, the Japanese electronics and entertainment company said in a release.

The display combines Sony's organic thin film transistor, or TFT, technology, which is required to make flexible displays, with another kind of technology called organic electroluminescent display, it said.

The latter technology is not as widespread for gadgets as the two main display technologies now on the market — liquid crystal displays and plasma display panels.

Although flat-panel TVs are getting slimmer, a display that's so thin it bends in a human hand marks a breakthrough.

Sony said plans for a commercial product using the technology were still undecided.

Sony President Ryoji Chubachi has said a film-like display is a major technology his company is working on to boost its status as a technological powerhouse.

In a meeting with reporters more than a year ago, he boasted Sony was working on a technology for displays so thin it could be rolled up like paper, and that the world would stand up and take notice.

Some analysts have said Sony, which makes Walkman portable players and PlayStation 3 video game machines, had fallen behind rivals in flat-panel technology, including Samsung Electronics Co. of South Korea and Sharp Corp. of Japan.

But Sony has been marking a turnaround under Chubachi and Chief Executive Howard Stringer, the first foreigner to head Sony, including reducing jobs, shuttering unprofitable businesses and strengthening its flat TV offerings.

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On the Net:

Video of Sony's new display: mms://station.streaming-tv.net/sonypr/OLED070524_750kbps.wmv