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LG to Supply OLED Displays for Upcoming Apple iWatch?

Posted October 29, 2013 at 3:35pm by iClarified · 9661 views
A new report from the Korea Herald says LG Display is close to signing a deal with Apple to provide OLED displays for its rumored iWatch.

“LG Display has been in talks over flexible organic light-emitting diode panels for quite a while and it looks like it will be sealing the deal with Apple,” one expert said on condition of anonymity.

Though the company may sign with Apple, the primary supplier of displays is said to be Taiwan's RiTDisplay.

“Instead of relying on one supplier for its iWatch, which will be unveiled next year, Apple will have two vendors to be safe. The key provider will be RiTDisplay and LG Display will be the second,” Seoul-based HMC Investment Securities’ analyst Kim Young-woo said. “Japan Display might also be a candidate, but so far its capacity seems lacking.”

Notably, Apple and Samsung may not be interested in working with each other on the iWatch display.

Samsung reportedly doesn't want to supply Apple with OLED displays.

“I do not expect Samsung Display to supply Apple with a smart watch OLED,” said one market source close to the matter. “Strategically, Samsung is using OLED to give a special ‘Samsung flavor’ to its devices, so opening up to other customers does not make sense.”

While Apple does not want to reveal more inside information to Samsung.

“Samsung will be excluded because Apple won’t want to leak its smart watch-related information to its rival Samsung. Samsung’s wearable gadget Galaxy Gear is already out in the market.”

A recent report said that Inventec is expected to land 60% of the orders for Apple's iWatch. The company is expected by some to debut the device in the second half of 2014.

Read More [via Sean]