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Sony Unveils 1st OLED Television

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By YURI KAGEYAMA, The Associated Press

Published: October 2, 2007

TOKYO - Sony on Monday showed the first television for the commercial market with an organic light-emitting diode display that it said symbolized the revival of the faltering Japanese electronics maker.

The 11-inch display TV called XEL-1 - set to go on sale Dec. 1 in Japan for 200,000 yen, or $1,700 - measures 3 millimeters thick, about the same as a coin.

Plans for overseas sales are undecided, Sony said. Production is set for 2,000 units a month, it said.

The XEL-1 uses new light-emitting display technology, called OLED and based on electroluminescent organic materials, to deliver clear image quality, even for the color black and a metallic sheen.

Sony officials said the technology is superior to liquid-crystal and plasma displays, now widely used in thin TVs, because OLED technology uses materials that emit light on their own and don't require a back light.

It also can relay video 1,000 times faster than liquid-crystal displays, eliminating the blur, and it reduces energy consumption by 40 percent, according to the company.

Sony Corp., which has movie and music as well as video-game businesses, fell behind rivals in display TVs and now makes liquid-crystal TVs in a partnership with rival Samsung Electronics Co.

Sony no longer makes plasma display TVs, a market dominated by Japanese rival Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., the maker of Panasonic products.

Sony President Ryoji Chubachi, in a rare appearance for a product launch, said the new TV answers criticism that Sony had failed to translate its technological prowess into attractive consumer products.

'The world's first OLED TV is a symbol of the rebirth of Sony with its superb technology,' he told reporters at Tokyo headquarters.

The new OLED TV will last 30,000 hours, about 10 years for someone using the TV eight hours a day. An equivalent Sony LCD TV lasts twice that long, Sony said.

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