What Does the Decline of Plasma Displays and Rise of Flexible Displays and OLEDs Mean for Silver?

Published: December 13, 2011    Category: Advanced Materials Electronics and Devices

The market for silver inks and pastes in one important sector – plasma display panels (PDPs) – is almost certainly in a period of slow and steady decline.  We do not anticipate that this market will completely disappear, but it is facing serious challenges. The latest LCDs rival the performance of PDPs in almost every characteristic important to the consumer, and this means that PDPs are now competing primarily on price. 

This situation robs the silver ink and paste industry of a major consumer of printed silver.  Suppliers of silver inks and pastes will need to find alternative markets in which to sell their products or face declining volumes.  The good news is that we think there are sizeable, emerging opportunities that will offer a way out.  The bad news, however, is that these emerging applications are not yet mature and are, in fact, probably at least several years out.   It is too early to say with much certainty what opportunities will ultimately succeed in this segment, but some possibilities are as follows:

Flexible displays have been talked about for many years, but now seem to be on the verge of commercialization (thanks largely to Samsung).  Commercialization of flexible displays implies the arrival of flexible backplanes – a huge challenge.  Such backplanes will require flexible interconnects that could be provided with silver traces of some kind.  Flexible displays are unlikely to appear on the market until 2012 or 2013, and no one can be sure if consumers will like them.  But if (say) they were to attract an iPad like following, they might represent a significant opportunity for silver inks going forward.

Another and, we think, even more promising future opportunity is the OLED lighting market. OLED lighting is poised for very rapid growth, especially after 2015, which is when it is anticipated that OLED lighting’s technical performance will be sufficient to meet market needs.  Currently, OLED lighting does not employ printed silver, but silver ink and paste suppliers should make the case now to OLED panel manufacturers that printed silver grids can enable the market to meet its full potential:

• Printed silver could be used beneficially in bus bars or grids to prevent visible brightness gradients and resistive heat losses caused by significant voltage drops across long spans of (less) conductive transparent electrodes, and

• Printed silver could be useful for interconnects for concatenated OLED lighting panels.

If OLED lighting ultimately attracts consumer attention, it could be another mass-market silver ink and paste consumer.  A good sign is that OLED lighting is attracting the attention of an impressive list of electronics and lighting companies, some of whom are building pilot plants to build OLED lighting panels.

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