Azumo

Technology

LCD 2.0

The Future of Energy-Efficient Display Technology is Here

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Embrace the Power of Ambient Light

LCD screens are no longer reserved for static devices, yet we continue to struggle with using devices that rapidly drain batteries or become illegible when moving through various lighting conditions. This is because traditional backlit displays fight ambient light instead of harnessing it, resulting in both strained eyes and strained batteries.

LCD 2.0 is here to fix this. By combining a reflective LCD (RLCD) with the Azumo Front Light Panel, LCD 2.0 is the first complete power-efficient solution for maintaining consistent display contrast across dynamic lighting conditions. This is possible because the display uses reflected ambient light when available but still includes a low-power front light option for clear and efficient low-light operations.

Now, devices across consumer, medical, industrial, and educational applications requiring LCD screens can be designed to do the unimaginable – simultaneously optimize both battery life and screen readability in all lighting conditions.

Key Benefits

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90% Power Savings

Instead of fighting the light around your device, the Azumo front light solution embraces it to provide a natural viewing experience, resulting in 10X power savings over traditional transmissive LCDs.

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Consistent Contrast

From bright sunlight to low- or no-light, RLCDs that include the Azumo front light solution provide a consistent contrast ratio across all environments, resulting in an optimal viewing experience

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Ultra-Thin Display Modules

With the ability to use a single off-the-shelf LED and light guide film that is just 0.05 mm, when added to a display stack, our front light solution feels like it is barely there.

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Low Heat Signature

Using a single LED, LCD 2.0 has a lower heat signature then a comparable LCD with a backlight

Optimizing Device Displays for All Lighting Conditions

Traditional LCDs have long fought against the conditions they work in – using power-hungry backlights to light a screen that is just competing against external light sources. The same holds true with emissive displays such as OLED and microLEDs. While the RLCD addresses this issue by replacing the rear polarizer with a mirror at the back of the pixels so that the LCD can harness the ambient light around it, this creates a new issue – when there is no ambient light or backlight, the display is nearly useless.

To help device designers stop making this tradeoff between power consumption and display readability, Azumo introduced LCD 2.0 – a complete power-efficient solution for RLCDs that uses reflected ambient light when available but also includes a low-power front light for efficient low-light operations. Now, device designers can look beyond simple readability specs to optimize their devices using more advanced specs such as ambient contrast ratio (ACR), resulting in devices that maintain consistent contrast across dynamic lighting conditions.

Learn more about LCD 2.0

Moving Beyond the Power-Hungry Backlight

Optimizing battery life for portable devices has long been a massive challenge for the tech industry, with most inefficiencies coming directly from the display stack, and the backlight specifically. This is because backlights are as bright as a car headlight, yet most of that energy is wasted by poor transmissivity and fighting external light sources. Instead, an RLCD optimizes battery usage by embracing ambient light to provide excellent readability, even in direct sunlight, offering 10X power savings over traditional transmissive LCDs.

But, to operate in low-light conditions, RLCDs need to be paired with an efficient front light solution such as the Azumo Front Light Panel. With improved optical coupling, collimation, and attenuation, our front light solution efficiently delivers more light exactly where you need it, and efficient LEDs can be used without experiencing typical issues with diffusion and material losses. Plus, as few as one low-power LED can be used in an Azumo front light instead of the five or more LEDs needed for alternative display light guides, making our solution the most efficient front light option available today.

Learn About Our Front Light Panel

Minimize the Presence of Your Display Stack

Our LCD 2.0 Solution, which includes an RLCD and our optically bonded front light panel, is designed to minimize the volume the display module takes up in a device. Since our light guide film can be made as thin as 50 microns, our LCD 2.0 solution takes up anywhere from 39 to 80 percent less volume than a typical backlit LCD module.

Our front light panel can use a single LED in the light bar, inserting light into a film that is thinner than a piece of paper. The light is mixed evenly throughout our ultrathin optical film, yielding a high-resolution display with a quick refresh rate and consistent contrast indoors and outdoors. Our solution can integrate with the front surface of most reflective displays – enabling the optimum LCD 2.0 display module for a wide-variety of devices and applications.

Learn About Our LIght Guide Film

Azumo’s Technology Behind LCD 2.0

LCD 2.0 means your devices can stop relying on power-hungry backlights. By reinventing light guide and front light technology, Azumo makes it possible to fully embrace the inherent power-saving features of RLCDs – from the brightest outdoor to the darkest indoor lighting environments.

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The Azumo Front Light Panel

The Azumo Front Light Panel is an ultra-thin front lighting solution that delivers the precise lighting profiles required to interact with the next generation of high-performance RLCDs. The Azumo Lightbar, which sits at the edge of the panel, provides better control of light than an array of discrete LEDs along an edge, which is what other front lighting options use. The light mixing region added between the lightbar and display further improves uniformity, resulting in an even field of light entering the display without the optical artifacts of “hot-spotting” or “laser-beaming.”

Additional benefits of integrating the Azumo Front Light Panel + RLCD into your device versus using a backlight or another front light option include the following:

  • 10X power savings by utilizing ambient light instead of fighting it
  • A thinner display stack
  • Bezel-free designs
  • Consistent contrast across lighting environments

Learn About Our Front Light Panel

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Our proprietary lightguide film is an essential component for delivering a high clarity, uniform front light system for RLCDs. At just 50 μm, our ultra-thin lightguide reduces overall device size and weight while maximizing display clarity. The flexibility of our film, with a bending radius of <1mm, enables the lightbar to be folded behind the display without any loss in optical
performance, providing maximum uniformity for a bezel-free design. Additionally, since light extraction features scale with lightguide thickness, and our optical system allows for the use of materials that are 5x thinner than traditional light guides, our film and the embedded micropatterns are inherently more invisible to enhance display clarity.

With as few as one off-the-shelf LEDs, our technology inserts light into a film that is thinner than a piece of paper, and also offers the following benefits:

  • The ability to use efficient LEDs while maintaining optical coupling efficiency without experiencing typical losses from diffusion and other required materials
  • Further energy optimization through improved optical coupling, collimation, and attenuation

Learn More About Our Lightguide Film

How LCD 2.0 Stacks Up

 

 

View Competitive Analysis: Backlight vs Frontlight 

Azumo patents

Azumo has more than 60 patents in the U.S., the Americas, Europe, and Asia for our technology across the following three categories:

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Lighting technology

The basis of Azumo tech.

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Manufacturing methods

How we make out ultra-thin light guides and front light panels.

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Product applications

Ways to use our front light panel, light guide film, and more.

Frequently Asked Questions

LCD 2.0 combines a reflective LCD (RLCD) with the Azumo Front Light Panel and Azumo Lightguide Film, offering the first complete power-efficient solution for maintaining consistent display contrast across dynamic lighting conditions.

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In a backlight display, light is beamed from behind the display, while a front light transmits light from an LED array at the edge of the device to a central area through light guides – reducing strain on both a consumer’s eyes and the device’s battery.

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Azumo LCD 2.0 display modules are compatible with standard LCD drivers, making it easy for engineers to design one of our modules into any device that would use a traditional LCD.

Azumo front light technology comes in a variety of display size options and is well suited for a variety of applications including defense, medical, educational, industrial, consumer, and automotive devices.

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How Backlit LCD Compares to Frontlit Reflective LCD

See a detailed comparison of the features of today’s backlit LCDs versus newer frontlit RLCDs for a variety of applications.

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LCD 2.0 in Action

Aarcomm chose LCD 2.0 for their industrial remote control because of its easy readability, energy efficiency for long shifts outdoors, and completely digital interface.

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The Science Behind LCD 2.0

The benefits of LCD 2.0 are achieved through advanced science, created & constantly improved by our exceptional engineering team.

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