Latest Cutting-Edge Green Innovations for Large-Sized TFT-LCDs

May 14 2008

AU Optronics Corp. will exhibit its latest cutting-edge green innovations for large-sized TFT-LCDs at SID (Society for Information Display) 2008, from May 20 through 22 in Los Angeles, California. The AUO Green Innovations exhibit, AUO's first large-scale exhibition after its "Green Solutions" announcement, will include a wide range of energy-saving technologies and LED technologies together with a less than 10 mm thick ultra slim 42" LCD TV panel.

According to Dr. B.D. Liu, Vice President of the AUO Technology Center, "Our four major domains of green innovations are Energy Saving, Material Saving, Environment Friendly and Lean Design. These four principles will not only drive future innovation and development trends, but will also become competitive advantages for AUO in providing customers high value-added green products."

The four domains of AUO's green innovations are as follows:

Energy Saving

AUO continues in the development of its new generation AMVA III technologies to provide static contrast ratio>5000:1 with higher transmittance to increase the energy utilization rate. AUO's RGBW -- Technology can increase 30% luminance with up to almost 20% power saving in NB applications. In addition, AUO latest 46" eco-friendly LCD TV panels can also save up to 50% in terms of power consumption.

Material Saving

The latest Ink-Jet Printing Color Filter technology allows saving up to at least one third of material use and also reduces chemical waste.

Environment Friendly

AUO leads in terms of legal compliance restricting hazardous substances and continues to develop some new technologies to implement LED backlighting. One ultra slim 42" LCD TV with LED offers a stylish design with less than 10mm module thickness, and another new technology of "High Dynamic Contrast" improves the contrast ratio above 200,000:1 by adopting 16x8 LED blocks for local dimming function.

Lean Design

AUO has successfully developed a 20.1 inch ultra slim TFT-LCD with single connection cascade chip on glass architecture technology. This new architecture adopts several novel designs to save space and assembling time with no changes in the production process.

The new technologies that will be showcased at SID 2008 include:

Ultra Slim 42" LCD TV with LED, featuring both power-saving and

stylish design trend

With advanced thermal and optical technologies, AUO has successfully developed ultra-slim 42" TFT-LCDs with LED technology to meet the TV market trends. This new LED TV technology with less than 10mm module thickness also reduces the weight significantly -- by 44% comparing to conventional models, reaching a high brightness at 450 nits with excellent luminance and uniformity performance. In addition, highly efficient white LEDs can further reduce power consumption and simplify the driving circuit. Therefore, AUO's 42" slim LCD panels provide end users more flexibility for applications, can utilize either wall mounts or individual stands, and can bring viewers enhanced stylish enjoyment and power-saving benefits in their LCD displays.

AUO latest 46" ECO-Friendly LCD TV panel, saving up to 50% in power

consumption

AUO takes global warming seriously, and has developed its latest eco- friendly LCD TV technology with energy-saving and environmental protection features by optimizing the CCFL backlight unit design. AUO's latest 46-inch LCD TV panels are able to reduce power consumption by up to 50% and yet retain 500 nits brightness and 5,000:1 ultra static high contrast ratio, even providing better image quality performance than traditional LCD TV panels. If every household watched television for six hours per day, the electric power consumption would save 263 kilowatt hour per household per year, and save more than 168 kilograms of CO2 into the air (1).

(1) The data is based upon 2006 Taiwan CO2 Emission Factor for Electricity.

Latest Ink-Jet Printing Color Filter Technology, saving 1/3 material and reducing waste As LCD sizes are getting larger, productivity of large size substrates become a concern. As a result, AUO has adopted green production processes for color filters to meet environmental protection requirements. Ink-jet printing (IJP) technology, a new generation of color filter manufacturing methods, can easily simplify the process steps as well as improve the tact time. Furthermore, IJP technology is photo-mask free and implements a more simple printing process instead of a complicated exposure and development process, which can notably save up to at least one third of the material used and reduce chemical waste when compared with other printing technologies. As a consequence, the Ink-jet printing process is an environment-friendly technology.

AUO exhibit highlights for large-sized technologies at SID 2008 also include: