With hundreds of thousands of attendees streaming through the doors of international trade shows like IFA in Berlin and CES in Las Vegas every year, the largest of consumer electronic shows have outgrown their industry-only beginnings to attain a certain level of pop culture recognition. Parallel to this world of consumer electronics unfolds InfoComm, a huge shadow industries tech show specifically aimed at retail, hospitality, entertainment venues, corporate, and transportation.
Hosted in Orlando, Florida, the one week trade show brings together a wide expanse of companies and attendees from around the world representing audio, video, digital signage, and collaboration technology (there’s also some interesting odds and ends exhibitors dedicated to supplying stage theatrics in the form of smoke machines and lasers in a corner hall). Exhibitors span from enormous multi-national corporations to smaller start-ups, with a slew of industry related presentations, seminars, and panels revealing everything from details of music programming and sound systems used within restaurants to the future of hotel lobby technology or analytics of fast food signage. InfoComm is an insider show for sure, but fascinating nevertheless for the depth of solutions and seminars scheduled.
Most noticeable and impressive of all InfoComm 2019 exhibitors was the LG Business Solutions booth, an enormous and multi-room showcase composed of curved, transparent, and multi-panel OLED, LED, and Micro LED displays, each aimed at the sectors of retail, hotels, transportation, and museums. First revealed earlier this year at ISE 2019 in Amsterdam, several forms of transparent OLED signage – from jewelry display cases to mock museum windows – previewed the bright possibilities of displays capable of transforming from a fully transparent window into a full color HD display.
Crowds gathered to the LG booth to inspect the layered applications of transparent OLEDs, some creating mesmerizing parallax-effects, others interacting with real world objects. Colors and contrast were impressive considering the non-optimal, bright environment of a trade show floor, though viewing angle still comes into play for optimal image quality.
Though none of these specific OLED displays from LG showcased at InfoComm were developed to serve the consumer market, many are slated to become commonplace within stores, museums, transportation terminals, and hotels in short time. No doubt, consumer solutions will eventually follow, but for now large OLED displays (transparent or otherwise) will remain a “premium solution warranting a premium price”, with the promise of brighter, more adaptable, and ever higher resolution displays everywhere we look looming around the corner.