Importing Micro LEDs from Apple Watch is not practical or cost effective

According to reports, Apple is actively introducing MicroLED, and may be equipped with AppleWatch to replace the existing OLED panel, which is expected to appear in the new smart watch after 2020. However, according to analyst analysis, this news is not correct.

MicroLED does not meet the smart watch use situation

Regardless of the industrial development or process technology of MicroLED, it is unlikely that MicroLED will replace the existing OLED screen in terms of the characteristics of smart watch products. Because the usage habits of smart watches are different from those of smart phones, consumers do not need to control them at any time. The screen is used to get a lot of information, only a small amount of reminder information is obtained when necessary, and the usual display is based on the image of the traditional surface, so the smart watch does not need a high-resolution screen.

The surface displayed is like the appearance of the product, which requires a variety of choices, so the demand for color performance and richness is relatively high, which is why the smart watches mostly use OLED panels, even Xiaomi’s new Xiaomi bracelet 4 The use of 0.95-inch color AMOLED screens has begun to represent consumer demand for wearable device screens.

In this case, the screen usage of the smart watch is not high, and the mobile phone is not the main component that consumes power. Most of the smart watches do not have the problem of insufficient battery life. Brand manufacturers naturally do not care about the power consumption of the screen. However, color is a priority, coupled with the difference between MicroLED and OLED. For brand manufacturers, the high resolution and power saving efficiency of MicroLED will not affect the improvement of sales volume. It is not worth paying the price difference at present. Therefore, MicroLED will not be used in smart watches.

Smart watches use context and corresponding screen requirements.

For Apple, AppleWatch's power consumption is indeed a problem, and why it started to adopt LTPOOLED, but this situation is based on Apple's desire to make AppleWatch a standalone device with independent Internet access. Because AppleWatch has more LTE than other smart watches, resulting in a large increase in power consumption and insufficient battery life, Apple must save power from other aspects to make up for this gap. LTPOOLED adoption is one of them.

As mentioned above, in the current use of smart watches, the frequency of use of the screen is not high, and the benefits of panel power saving are not much, not to mention the LTE version of AppleWatch is not the mainstream product in the market, consumers still buy the Bluetooth version of AppleWatch, Therefore, most consumers will not face the shortage of AppleWatch battery life; while AppleWatch4 adopts LTPOOLED screen, it does not increase battery capacity, but expands the screen size. On behalf of short time, battery life is not the main factor that plagues AppleWatch.

Therefore, AppleWatch will not use MicroLED, still choose LTPOOLED, and in order to make suppliers more diversified, in addition to the existing Korean suppliers, Apple will support JDI to supply LTPOOLED. When Apple invested resources to support more vendors to supply LTPOOLED to AppleWatch, it is naturally impossible to switch to other types of screens so quickly, instead choosing to use LTPOOLED in smart watches.