Kaneka Developed “Colorless Polyimide Film” for Flexible Displays

Kaneka Corporation (Headquarters: Minato-ku, Tokyo; President: Mamoru Kadokura) has developed “Colorless Polyimide Film”, the material for the cover window of flexible organic electroluminescent (EL) displays and will start sample shipment during the first half of fiscal year 2019. Kaneka will develop the market for “Colorless Polyimide Film” as the second largest product behind polyimide (PI) varnish ^*1 for TFT ^*2 substrate for organic EL displays, aiming for sales of at least 10 billion yen in 2025.

With high-volume video streaming increased thanks to the next generation high-speed communication standards (5G ^*3), it is expected that the market of flexible organic EL displays will rapidly expand, which will allow everyone to spread out displays and enjoy watching videos on a large display ^*4. By merging two self-developed technologies of the polyimide molecular designing technology and optical film making technology that Kaneka has built over the years, the company has now developed a transparent polyimide film with the properties that are required for cover films in a balanced manner, such as the transparency, surface hardness and glass-like appearance (surface smoothness), as well as enhanced flexibility that enables repeated bending and folding.

We will further focus our efforts on development of a variety of polyimide products that contributes to realization of flexible displays and high-speed communications (5G) to offer solutions that facilitates the realization of an era of IoT/ AI.

1. Liquid polyimide material. It can be used to form a film having high thermos-stability and high dimensional stability.
2. TFT is an abbreviation for a Thin Film Transistor. It controls light emission of organic EL elements.
3. An abbreviation for the fifth generation mobile communication system (5th Generation).
4. According to “36th IHS Markit Display Japan Forum”, the market of the organic EL display is expected to expand from 6.7 million m² in 2018 to 25.2 million m² in 2025.

Colorless Polyimide Film