Sony MicroLED Display

Overview / Introduction

• Executive Summary
• Reverse Costing Methodology
• Glossary

Company Profile & Supply Chain

• Skyworks
• Supply Chain

Physical Analysis

• Display Cell Disassembly
• MicroLED In Package
• Red microLED
  • Views & Dimensions
  • Cross-Section
• Blue microLED
• Green microLED
• microLED Driver IC
  • Views & Dimensions
  • Delayering
  • Die Cross-Section
  • Die Process Characteristics

Manufacturing Process Flow

• Red microLED Front-End Fab Unit and process
• Blue microLED
• Green microLED
• MicroLED In Package Front-End Fab Unit
• microLED Driver Front-End Fab Unit
• PCB Fab Unit and Process

Cost Analysis

• Supply Chain
• Yield Hypothesis
• Red MicroLED Cost
  • LED Front-End Cost
  • LED Die Probe Test and Dicing
  • LED Wafer and Cost
• Blue microLED Cost
• Green microLED Cost
• MicroLED In Package Cost
• RGB microLED Driver Cost
• Display UnitCost
  • Complete Unit Cost

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About Yole Group 

Sony launched its first very large micro light emitting diode (LED) displays at the end of 2019. This System Plus Consulting (SPC) teardown report provides some great insights into Sony’s choices. Among them, this new technology integrates an active matrix driving architecture.

In this report, SPC provides a full reverse costing study of the microLEDs and their assembly in Sony’s display cells. Sony adopts a tiled structure for its very large display. It calls each tile a cell, which measures 152 mm x 102 mm.

A cell comprises 9,600 red/green/blue (RGB) microLEDs, one for each pixel, with a pitch of 1.26mm. This is equivalent to a 4K display with a diagonal measurement of 219 inches. The cell integrates 9,600 RGB microLED driver integrated circuits (ICs).

• The RGB microLEDs are assembled as MicroLEDs-In-Packages (MIPs). The MIPs are manufactured with wafer level package technology based on fan-out Wafer Level Packaging (WLP).
• The MIPs allow connections to the green and blue LEDs in flip chip configuration and the red LED with top and bottom contacts.
• The RGB microLEDs measure 23 µm x 15 µm and the 28,800 microLEDs, 9,600 of three different colors, cover just 0.06% of the cell display area.
• The blue and green microLEDs are based on thin GaN-based dies. The red LEDs are based on GaAs-based dies. The RGB LEDs have an engineered light-emission pattern using dedicated dielectric and metallic reflectors. We believe that they are manufactured by Nichia in Japan.
• Each MIP with RGB LEDs is driven by one driver IC in active-matrix mode. The drivers have one channel per LED color.
• The assembly of the 9,600 MIPs on the Printed Circuit Board (PCB) don’t need solder. We believe the assembly to be done by Sony in Japan. The MIPs are mounted in flip-chip configuration.
• The driver ICs are 0.02mm² and encapsulated in a dedicated WLP developed to be assembled without solder like the MIPs.

This report provides insights regarding technology data with optical and Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) pictures, cross-sections, manufacturing cost, and selling price of the microLEDs, the MIP package, the driver ICs and the display. 

• Sony
• Nichia

Key Features

• Detailed optical and SEM photos
• Precise measurements
• Materials analysis
• Manufacturing process flow
• Supply chain evaluation
• Manufacturing cost analysis
• Estimated selling price

What's new

• Our first report on microLED displays.
• The technology can be used for large or small displays.
• This is a future technology for high-end TVs and AR/VR headsets.
• Each pixel is three microLEDs, red, green, and blue, plus a driver die to obtain a more powerful and higher contrast display than OLEDs produce.
• They use very small MicroLEDs-In-Packages, with red, green, and blue LEDs.
• They are assembled without solder.
• Sony’s red + green + blue microLED + microLED driver per pixel, active-matrix architecture is very interesting.