Polymertronics was set up in 2006 to develop technology to produce inkjet-printable, ultra-violet (UV) curable organic light-emitting diode (OLED) fluids. OLEDs that can be printed on standard UV-inkjet equipment have many advantages. They are much quicker and cheaper to produce than standard OLEDs, they can be designed and manufactured with very short lead times, they can be printed on to a range of exotic surfaces including flexible ones, they give a much sharper image than conventional OLEDs, and they have a huge range of uses in medicine, advertising, logistics, the security industry, smart packaging and other areas. UV-curable OLEDs can also be printed with UV-curable coloured inks.
An OLED polymer which can be cured with UV light in a few seconds has already been developed by the company. A 16 mm2 area will now light consistently and brightly and the longevity of the OLED has been improved from a few minutes to over 30 hours. At the same time a UV-curing system which can be attached to an industrial printer has been developed and a prototype is working satisfactorily.