Commercial Integrator February 2023 - 36

3 QUESTIONS
SPONSORED CONTENT
Planar on the
MicroLED Revolution
CI chats with Planar's Steve Seminario about the
company's leadership in MicroLED, an advancement
that is, arguably, the future of LED technology.
Commercial Integrator:
Please give a high-level
overview of MicroLED, its
market penetration so far
and in which environments
we're likeliest to see it.
Steve Seminario: Since its
emergence, MicroLED has captured
the attention of the pro
AV industry and demonstrated
its potential to be the future of
LED. To date, a majority of the
focus has been placed on the
premium end of the market,
looking at very fine pixel
pitches in the 0.6- to 0.9millimeter
range. Today's
adopters benefit from first-oftheir-kind,
high-resolution display
experiences as a result of
high dynamic range from deep
black to high brightness, while,
at the same time, using less
power. In addition, MicroLEDs,
which are defined by LED size
and typically classified as less
than 100 microns, allow customers
to achieve a lower pixel
pitch or greater pixel density as
a result of their small size.
Global demand for finepitch
LED products has grown
significantly in recent years,
and this includes MicroLED. Because
MicroLED is well suited
for high-precision visuals and
close viewing distances, we're
seeing strong demand for
mission-critical applications in
environments spanning control
rooms, corporate, government
and even high-end residential.
36
With MicroLED already well
penetrated into these premium
uses, we can expect to see it
extend into an even wider set of
applications before long. The
significant cost reductions that
we've seen in the past year in
MicroLED and flip chip technology
are expected to continue
as volumes ramp up further.
CI: Describe some of the
unique features and benefits
of MicroLED, such as
empowering integrators to
increase brightness levels
while, at the same time,
decreasing power usage.
Seminario: MicroLED powers
the highest-resolution display
experiences with superior
color reproduction and high
brightness, while also requiring
less power. In particular, the
leading-edge technology's
physical size enables support
for finer pixel pitches. It's also
unlocking significant improvements
in contrast and dynamic
range for any pitch as a result of
featuring very high peak brightness
levels and more black
surface area between pixels.
Our premium fine-pitch
Planar DirectLight Ultra Series,
for example, features models
with MicroLEDs much smaller
than standard LEDs but that
deliver better black levels
and up to three times more
brightness, while consuming
much less power per unit of
Commercial Integrator FEBRUARY 2023
Steve Seminario, vice president
of product marketing, Planar
brightness. Energy efficiency
is a key advantage of today's
MicroLED technology, allowing
customers to benefit from 24/7
reliability, long life and simplified
maintenance. With Planar
ActivAlign, the Planar DirectLight
Ultra Series' proprietary,
self-adjusting alignment system,
perfect pixel alignment
is maintained over time. This
helps reduce maintenance,
maintain seamless visuals, and
compensate for possible vibration
and thermal expansion,
which can cause LED modules
to shift.
MicroLED is enabling
integrators to deploy more
premium offerings with fine
pitches, outstanding visual
performance and efficient
energy usage.
CI: What is Planar doing
to capitalize on the ripe
MicroLED opportunity?
What can industry stakeholders
look forward to in
the near-term future?
Seminario: Planar's MicroLED
leadership is backed by an
impressive collection of
fine-pitch LED installations appearing
all over the world. As
an early investor in MicroLED,
including making a significant
R&D investment in MicroLED
die, pixel packaging and
module manufacturing technology,
Planar is steadfastly
dedicated to ongoing product
innovation and industry
education to help customers
capitalize on the advantages
that are already available.
With MicroLED being a relatively
new technology for the
industry, customers naturally
have questions about it. With
the Planar EverCare Lifetime
Limited Warranty, customers
get total assurance - with
complete product coverage
from controller to sub-pixel,
and everything in between.
Following our release of
the award-winning Planar
DirectLight Ultra Series in
2021, we've been putting
more focus on making
MicroLED more accessible
to more customers in more
markets. Recently, we demonstrated
this with our significant
price decrease to the
Planar DirectLight Ultra Series
0.6-, 0.7- and 0.9-millimeter
MicroLED videowall displays,
as well as price reductions for
Planar DirectLight Ultra Series
1.2-millimeter and Planar TVF
Series 0.9-millimeter products.
Our intention was to
provide customers with lower
prices, while giving integrators
increased margins.
With continued investment,
we aim to drive the benefits of
MicroLED to more products
and customer use cases in
order to spread its inherent
benefits to more places in the
market.
commercialintegrator.com
http://www.commercialintegrator.com
Commercial Integrator February 2023

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