We fabricate long-lived organic light-emitting devices using a 175 μm thick polyethylene terephthalate substrate coated with an organic–inorganic multilayered barrier film and compare the rate of degradation to glass-based devices. The observed permeation rate of water vapor through the plastic substrate was estimated to be 2×10−6 g/m2/day. Driven at 2.5 mA/cm2, we measure a device lifetime of 3800 h from an initial luminance of 425 cd/m2.

We describe encapsulated passive matrix, video rate organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays on flexible plastic substrates using a multilayer barrier encapsulation technology. The flexible OLED (FOLED™) displays are based on highly efficient electrophosphorescent OLED (PHOLED™) technology deposited on barrier coated plastic (Flexible Glass™ substrate) and are hermetically sealed with an optically transmissive multilayer barrier coating (Barix™ encapsulation). Preliminary lifetime to half initial luminance (L0∼100 cd/m2) of order 200 h is achieved on the passive matrix driven encapsulated 80 dpi displays; 2500 h lifetime is achieved on a dc tested encapsulated 5 mm2 FOLED test pixel. The encapsulated displays are flexed 1000 times around a 1 in. diameter cylinder and show minimal damage.

Films of a hybrid material with part-SiO2 part-silicone character are deposited as environmental barriers on bottom-emitting and on transparent organic light-emitting diodes. Devices coated with this barrier have lifetimes of up to ∼7500h when stored at 65°C and 85% relative humidity, by far exceeding the industrial requirement of 1000h. The intensity of the Si–O–Si absorption at the wavenumber of 1075cm−1, the wetting angle by water, and the indentation hardness support the interpretation of a homogeneous material with the properties of a SiO2-silicone hybrid. The films remain intact over 58600cycles of bending to ∼0.2% tensile strain.

We characterize a recently discovered material that forms an ultra-hermetic environmental barrier layer for the protection of organic light-emitting displays. The layer is deposited by plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PE-CVD) from the nontoxic precursor gases, hexamethyl disiloxane and oxygen. We measured the PE-CVD deposition rate, wet and dry etch rates, IR absorption spectrum, wetting contact angle with water, surface roughness and phase shift from atomic force microscopy, coefficient of thermal expansion, elastic modulus, critical tensile strain, indentation hardness, optical absorption spectrum, refractive index, relative dielectric constant, and electrical conduction, many over a range of PE-CVD conditions. The properties reflect a continuous transition from those of plasma-polymerized silicon to those of silicon dioxide prepared by thermal oxidation of silicon. In addition to low permeability, the critical strain, fracture toughness, thermal expansion coefficient, optical transmittance, and refractive index have values that are desirable in a hermetic encapsulant for organic light-emitting displays.

We demonstrate full color, top emission, active matrix OLED displays on flexible stainless steel substrates. The 100 dpi QVGA displays are driven by LTPS TFT backplane with excimer laser annealed poly‐Si. To our knowledge this is the world's highest resolution full color flexible AMOLED display on steel foil demonstrated to date. Encapsulation is by a multilayer thin film.