FLCoS: a promising path towards small form-factor, high performance color-sequential micro-displays
Thomas Charisoulis, Ziqian He, Fenglin Peng, John A. DeFranco, Yun Wang, Barry Silverstein, Yuta Kanamori, Tomohiro Ando, Rikoku Nakamura · 2025
The advent of modern AR applications has sparked a trend towards display miniaturization, driving the development of smaller, more efficient displays that can be seamlessly integrated into wearable devices. As AR technology continues to advance, the demand for high-performance displays that can deliver fast switching speeds, high contrast ratios, and small pixel pitch has become increasingly important. Ferroelectric Liquid Crystals on Silicon (FLCoS) offer several advantages over traditional Liquid Crystal displays in this regard. Firstly, FLCoS exhibits faster switching speeds, with a 10x improvement over Nematic LCoS, which reduces color breakup. Additionally, FLCoS provides good contrast ratios without using a compensator plate, with sequential contrast of 800:1 – 1400:1. Furthermore, FLCoS offers improvements in ID, with FLC materials enabling the smallest pixel pitch possible in the industry today. The technology is relatively mature, with millions of units shipping. Overall, FLCoS offers a promising solution for AR display applications that require fast switching speeds, high contrast ratios, and small pixel pitches, making it a great option for AR applications.