July Summary

July issues of Projection Monthly and Microdisplay Report

The July issues of Projection Monthly and Microdisplay Report are done - and are we tired. With the Projection Summit and InfoComm keeping us busy in June, there was a lot of news to report - 111 pages worth in Projection Monthly. And, I hope you agree that this is not merely a collection of press releases, but edited, organized news that goes beyond the headlines to deliver what you want and a bit more.

Continuing the theme of patting ourselves on the back, we were happy with the Projection Summit this year as attendance was nearly as good as last year. Your comments were mostly favorable, but there are areas of improvement we will work on for next year. Your further thoughts and comments are welcome. For registered attendees, you should be getting the CD of the full proceedings any day, and for those of you that missed it, you can now buy them on our web site. There is also a summary of the conference presentations and exhibitors.

Insight Media has also teamed up with Japan-based Techno System Research to offer the English language edition of their Home Projector: Positioning Front/PTV in the Large Panel Era report. But don't be fooled by the Home Projector title, this very detailed report covers all competing big-screen technologies for the home entertainment market.

Coming in July will be the Microdisplay Module Forecast and Company Profile Report by Insight Media & McLaughlin Consulting Group. This will evaluate a number of different forecast reports to produce our view of the microdisplay market.

In this month's other news coverage, we have several exclusive reports on developments at the microdisplay device level. For example, Flixel is a new Israeli company with a novel MEMS display concept. It opens and shut pixels in a transmissive panel like a door, but not using a torsional system. How do they do it? You'll have to read about it. Another MEMS start-up, Reflectivity is in the news this month as it is in the hunt for some more money to move to production. Will a viable MEMS alternative to DLP ever arrive?

Kagutech is a design company in Texas with a better backplane idea. The LCOS silicon design features a reduction in the size of the support memory and a major cut in the processing power needed to digitally drive the display. Meanwhile, Kopin reports it has developed a Multi-domain Vertical Alignment (MVA) LCD process exhibiting high contrast ratio and wide, symmetrical viewing-angle performance.

In the electronics segment, ADI has a new 12-bit driver for HTPS-LCD microdisplay along with low-power DACs. Silicon Image has a new serial transport pair that can drive QXGA panels with a single transmit/receive chip set. ViSX has a new wireless management system that helps improves video performance to projectors, among other products, while Pixelworks has raised the bar in keystone correction with a new point and click feature. eWARP developers Silicon Optix and Liesegang mad news last month too. Liesegang reports its newest chip has warping functions and a display controller built-in together. Silicon Optix has packaged it eWARP chip into an outboard video processor for home theater enthusiasts.

There was also much news in new screen technology. Perhaps the most exciting was the debut of the Blue Ocean screen from Nitto Jushi Kogyo Co. The Blue Ocean screen is a single acrylic polymer substrate material that is embedded with scattering elements and dye molecules. The scattering elements produce multiple forward scattering of light from the engine, emitting into a wide field of view - no Fresnel, no lenticular. DNP was busy making its screens get bigger while Kuraray is boosting production of CRT-RPTV screens. Draper's new high-contrast screen material looks pretty good too.

In illumination, Osram has developed a new very compact lamp and ballast system that is one of the key ingredients behind the new 3.5-pound DLP projector, LC5341/31, from Philips. And Philips "BackMirror" and driver reduction effort help enable the 1.98-pound InFocus LP290, unveiled at InfoComm.

We saw a lot of cool stuff in the optics and engines category. For example, ColorLink's new PolarCorrect family of compensators has the potential to turn run of the mill PBS assemblies into high contrast components - cool. Wavien's new Super Cube polarization recovery scheme is so simple it doesn't even require a quarter wave plate - cool. And, the company says that lensed light pipes can lead to up to 20% brightness increases - cool again.

We saw an interesting 1080p single-panel LCOS prototype from Microdisplay Corporation, one of the first SCR prototypes from Sim2 (for monitors, no less), and 720p single-panel LCOS engines from Microdisplay and MicroVue. Philips has detailed its plans for single-panel LCOS too.

Kolin reports it is starting to ship a 50-inch LCOS RPTV with JVC panels. We note in this issue that JVC has lowered prices in a bid to provide some real competition to DLP-RPTV. But TI just keeps going. Its latest deal is with Skyworth, its first Chinese TV set partner.

InfoComm spawned a ton of new projector debuts. Some of the more noteworthy ones include the InFocus and Philips projectors mentioned above, HP's new Pro AV projectors and Sharp's 3,000-lumen unit. ViewSonic has lowered the price on its 2-pound XGA projector to $2,000, the best MSRP yet, we believe. HP will sell its new projectors only through ProAV dealers, which has made them happy, and the projectors offer new technology like dual color wheels that creates "three projectors in one." Plus, the wireless connectivity is supposed to be very impressive, although we didn't see it demonstrated.

Home theater has a new brand - Qualia from Sony. This is where Sony's LCOS projector will debut at $20K. But it will have much lower priced competition like the ScreenPlay 5700 ($5K), Mitsubishi ($2K), Optoma ($6K), Philips ($2.5K) and Vidikron ($5.5K to $10K). Of course Faroudja will top the heap with a $50K offering. Seems you can pay anything you want in home theater.

The new 2048 x 1080 chip set from TI is getting some action too. Barco has matched similar Digital Cinema offering from Christie and Digital projection, while Christie demoed a repacked version aimed at the rental and staging market. By integrating the lamp head into the projector and offering a second box with power supplies, electronics and ballasts, the 2K-projector is much more moveable - and useable, by the rental and staging crews.

Meanwhile, Cable TV is finally getting on the digital bandwagon and pushing the FCC for adoption of the new rules. But it, and many others, is recognizing the magnitude of the DTV/HDTV confusion in the general public. You can learn more about this in the Market Intelligence section, as a well as some of the latest market forecast numbers and shipment data.

Fourth-generation PDP, fifth-generation LCD and seventh-generation LCD fabs are all in the news this month as Chinese, Taiwanese, Japanese and Korean companies continue to plan expansion of these technologies. Production capacity is coming, but how will it change the market? Everyone has a different answer, so forecasting remains difficult.

In channel news, we are seeing a mixed bag of sales increases/decreases and profitability from the major electronics chains. The whole nature of AV retailing is changing and we are not sure if these giants will be able to adopt fast enough. Stay tuned.

If you liked this snap shot of the news in the projection industry this month - and you are not a subscriber, then you may want to look at Projection Monthly or Microdisplay Report. After all, decisions without knowledge is just guesswork. Please contact Dave Torromeo (203-831-8464, dave@insightmedia.info) if you want to learn more.

Until next time…

Chris Chinnock
Sr. Analyst
Insight Media
chris@insightmedia.info

July Issue of Projection Monthly Table of Contents

July Issue of Microdisplay Report Table of Contents

If you would like information about a subscription to Projection Monthly or Microdisplay Report, then please email Dave Torromeo, dave@insightmedia.info, or call 203-831-8464.