Manufacturing and commercialization issues in organic electronics

Techniques for manufacturing organic electronic devices [organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs), photovoltaic cells, transistors, and solid-state memory] are reviewed and analyzed with respect to cost and market fitness in comparison to competitive approaches based on silicon electronics. The conclusions are (i) OLED displays will be successful using infrastructure largely borrowed from liquid crystal displays, because they provide fundamental customer value not dependent on lower cost; (ii) OLEDs for general lighting and organic–inorganic hybrid photovoltaic cells currently confront substantial barriers in cost and efficiency, but solutions appear feasible and would lead to very large volume businesses; (iii) organic crossbar memories are promising, but require innovations in driver architecture and interconnection; and (iv) organic transistors have not yet found a viable major market, but have great promise for highly customized, small-volume product runs using digital patterning techniques.