SBIR Phase I: MatchBox Display Systems

Southeast Techinventures, Durham NC

Investigators

Abstract

This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project aims to design, fabricate and test a novel Liquid Crystal on Silicon (LCOS) color display system that includes improved integrated pixel driver backplane integrated into a low cost, projection TV light engine. This LCOS display system will have excellent picture quality, high manufacturing yield potential and exceed all quality benchmarks of business projection displays from size, weight, manufacturing cost and brightness and will reduce the need for high speed CMOS technology thus reducing IC manufacturing costs. The LCOS development includes design of a full custom, mixed signal integrated circuit (IC), LED sourced light engine and mechanical sub-assembly. The IC will contain novel pixel circuits that remove charge sharing noise and expand charge storage memory increasing display brightness and contrast ratio. This Phase I objective is to prototype and demonstrate LCOS display technology positioning STI to penetrate 10% of current $5.2B business display market with an OEM display parts kit during the Phase II grant period. This display market includes business multimedia projectors and HDTV project displays, which is expected to grow to $20 billion by 2007.