Display Technology | Display Metrology | Thermo Fisher Scientific

Displays are an essential part of our daily lives. Over the past decade, mainstream display technology has transitioned from LCD to OLED with new technologies such as quantum dot and micro-LED emerging. Resolution, luminance, form factor, reliability, and quality are driving continuous innovation in display development.

As display technologies advance, research and development, process metrology, and failure analysis challenges increase, requiring fast time-to-data and reliable solutions.

Engineering future generations of advanced display technology

Improving display quality and light conversion efficiency, while continuing to increase yields and reducing production costs is critical.

Mainstream (OLED) technology is striving to deliver a longer display life and new form factors, leading to the continued development of thin-film encapsulation (TFE) technology. The evolution from quantum dot enhancement film (QDEF) to electroluminescent QD LED demands precise characterization and control over the size and shape of the microstructure. For micro-LED, there is a continued desire to improve its external quantum efficiency and reduce leakage current.

These advancements introduce new engineering challenges that necessitate nano-scale analysis, repeatable performance, and high-quality data from S/TEM based analytical workflows.

Semiconductor process metrology for high-quality display device manufacturing

As designers shrink the dimensions of display technology, the need for high accuracy metrology increases. Reducing pixel size improves resolution, reducing the display thickness increases energy conversion. New architectures require the critical dimensions (CD) of the backplane and the light-emitting unit be controlled accurately in both lateral and vertical directions. Tighter design specifications require fast FIB/SEM based metrology with a high degree of automation and repeatability.

Failure analysis of display technology

Display device manufacturing is increasingly complex. Defects due to particles, contamination, or process deviations can impact panel yield and productivity. As pixel size shrinks laterally, and structural complexity increases, traditional optical inspection methods no longer detect all the “killer” defects. With defects occurring in the panel or the fully assembled display module, isolating the defect to a particular depth or vertical layer becomes more challenging. This places a greater premium on solutions and workflows that deliver thin slices through large volume samples with surgical precision and minimal damage while providing high-resolution images to identify defects quickly and confidently.

Thermo Fisher Scientific offers a unique and comprehensive set of workflows to meet the R&D, metrology, and defect characterization needs of the advanced display industry.

Example workflows