The Chinese display manufacturer BOE seems to b working on In-display fingerprint scanner for LCD. BOE has recently revealed that it has now successfully implemented optical in-display fingerprint scanner into a conventional LCD panel. This is a huge breakthrough for the low-end and mid-range market segment because the nature of LCD panels didn’t allow fingerprint scanners under the screen until now. The additional backlight layer and the fact that is generally thicker than OLEDs were the main hurdles to overcome.
According to DigiTimes today, “the company plans to begin mass production of LCD panels embedded with in-display fingerprint sensors at the end of 2019. There’s no mention of which companies will line up and buy the displays.”
According to market analysts, about 85% of the total 1,456 billion smartphones shipped are using LCD panels in 2018. Obviously, the trend is slowly shifting in favor of OLEDs, but we have still a long way to go.
Bringing an in-display fingerprint scanning solution for the cheaper screens will enable manufacturers to offer these features on phones in the budget segment. Additionally, the demand for full-screen smartphones is on the rise, and so is the penetration. In 2019, the demand is estimated to be somewhere around 1.26 billion units, going up to 1.46 billion units in 2020.
The in-display fingerprint scanning technology would allow budget phones to feature in-display fingerprint sensors. Such sensors are typically found on flagship smartphones mostly above $500. In the upcoming year, we could possibly see the Moto G8 and budget offerings from Xiaomi, Huawei, Honor, and others with in-display fingerprint sensors.