Manufacturing flat panel displays involves precise layering of materials including glass, semiconductors, metals, and polarizing films and subjecting them to many sophisticated etching and electrochemical processing steps. As consumers demand bigger, better displays at lower prices, manufacturers must make continual improvement in quality and yield. Optical inspection is the most effective, efficient approach, and manufacturers are moving to 100% inspection of each panel after every major processing step. Once again, the goal is to inspect more often, with greater precision, and still reduce the overall time of inspection.

New generations of OLED displays with their high pixel densities require even higher resolution and sensitivity for quality inspection. Teledyne DALSA's high resolution and high speed linescan and TDI cameras find extensive use inspecting virtually every layer in flat panel manufacture. The high resolution (16k pixels) and high speed of our PiranhaXL and Piranha HS cameras allows inspection systems to boost throughput, while the excellent image quality delivers the highest level of discrimination between materials and mask layers. Manufacturers also use our high resolution area scan cameras for low contrast and nonuniform brightness (mura) and backlight inspection.