It's a bit odd that we've never heard about them before, but here's a company that basically claims to have found the holy grail of the consumer electronics industry. Under the leadership of Dr. William J. Ray (the person to the right of the photo),
Quantum Paper Inc produced an electronic paper that would put the company hundreds of light years ahead of its competition (read:
E Ink). A quote from the CTO:
"It is one of the most important developments in printing in more than 10 years. The paper is a unique marriage between the relative simplicity and low cost of printing and the high technology of pixel-based electronic displays." He claimed it had the potential to replace mobile phone and computer screens, interactive billboards and high-definition TVs at a "fraction of today's cost".
This sounds sketchy as hell, but it doesn't end here. Quantum's paper technology offers full color capability, high resolution the equivalent of HDTV, flexibility (can be rolled), can display written text, pictures and television-type animations, can be scaled to billboard size and larger, has a low power consumption and long lifespan, with wide viewing angle, and is environmentally and electrically safe. OK, stop - we'll believe that when we see it.
[via
PrintWeek and
packagePrinting]