By Haibin Zhang, ESI.
Due to their excellent strength, chemical resistance, and optical transparency, glass materials are widely used in consumer electronics such as in flat panel TVs, laptops, and hand-held devices. Small to medium form factor glass panels (3 to 10 inch), in particular, are enjoying a very healthy annual growth of close to 20% thanks to the recent boom in high end smart phones, e-readers, and tablets.
An anatomy on most of these popular gadgets reveals several layers of glass panels: first is a strengthened piece of cover glass that has extremely high compressive stress to protect the devices from impacts, scratches, stains, and harmful chemicals. Underneath the cover is a thin layer of glass deposited with two-dimensional ITO patterns (in most cases) to support touch functions. Display glass such as LCD or OLED modules lies beneath these two layers and provides vivid images and video playbacks at high contrasts. Different functions of these glass substrates require different designs: on the cover glass curvilinear and internal features are needed to generate rounded corners, streamlined perimeters, speaker holes, and home buttons. Touch panel and display module generally only need straight cuts for panel singulation from a mother sheet.