LG Touts OLED Evo, QNED Mini LED TV Innovations for 2021 at Virtual CES

OLED Evo will be used in LG’s new Gallery Series of TVs, said Tim Alessi, senior director-home entertainment product marketing. OLED Evo will be built into 55-, 65- and 77-inch screen sizes, he said. The 2021 OLED TV lineup will include LG’s Gen 4 Alpha 9 processor, with “powerful upscaling” and “deep learning,” he said. A feature called AI Picture Pro detects objects and backgrounds within scenes, and “processes each separately for clearer text and better image rendering,” said Alessi. “It can also optimize picture quality by automatically detecting content genre, scene conditions and ambient lighting conditions.”

The Gen 4 Alpha 9 also upgrades the AI Sound Pro feature with the ability to “upmix audio” to a virtual 5.1.2-channel array, rendering a “more immersive sound experience just using the TV speakers,” said Alessi. A second AI Sound Pro improvement, “audio volume leveling,” solves the “annoying problem of varying sound levels when you switch channels or streaming apps,” he said. CTA applied in October to trademark similar functionality, under the branding Voice +, for a feature enabled by the Dolby AC-4 codec in ATSC 3.0-compliant TVs (see 2010290016). Alessi’s presentation made no mention of new 3.0-compatible LG TVs for 2021.

OLED TV products from LG are "undoubtedly a dream come true for anyone who loves cinema," said Alessi. "Beloved" by consumers globally, "they're also used by some of the biggest names in Hollywood, and other professionals working in the creative industry," he said. A video clip showed LG OLED TV installations in a Disney Studiolab viewing room at the El Capitan Theatre.

LG’s “most advanced” LCD TVs are Mini LED models that will carry the QNED (quantum nano emitting diode) branding for 2021, said Alessi. QNED TVs enable “bigger, brighter pictures,” plus better blacks and improved color performance, he said.

The QNED line will be available in screen sizes from 65 to 86 inches, said Alessi. LG previewed the QNED CES 2021 introduction in late December (see 2012290018). LG Electronics and Samsung Display applied two weeks apart in September to trademark QNED for future generations of display technology (see 2010080037).

CES 2021 Notebook

Panasonic Automotive, Klipsch and Dolby Labs are collaborating to bring the Dolby Atmos music "experience" to vehicles in a “proof-of-concept” initiative through Panasonic's Spyder car infotainment platform, announced the companies Monday. Klipsch and Dolby Atmos Music “are leading many of the innovative approaches to bringing Dolby Atmos music to the home, on-the-go and now, working with Panasonic Automotive, to bring the Dolby Atmos experience to the road,” they said. "We want your music experience in the vehicle to be so immersive, you'll feel like you're inside the song," said Scott Kirchner, Panasonic Automotive Systems America president.

Mobileye crossed a “threshold” into now having the capability to build high-definition autonomous-vehicle (AV) maps “at scale,” said CEO Amnon Shashua, senior vice president of its Intel parent. “We’re basically mapping the world, all automatically, everything done in the cloud,” he said. Mobileye can’t send 20-30 engineers to an AV test “site,” as it did before COVID-19, but it managed in just two recent weeks to map more than 12,000 miles of “driving data” in Munich using two “field support employees,” he said. “They’re not even engineers.” This gave Mobileye the confidence it could “scale,” so it’s planning similar deployments in Detroit, Paris and Tokyo, he said. “If we figure out how” to land a regulatory OK, Mobileye will “deploy” in New York City as well, “all in the matter of the next few months,” he said. New York State Department of Transportation officials didn’t respond to questions. Self-driving robotaxis will be “somewhat of a game-changer when they become ubiquitous,” said Shashua. “Removing the driver from the equation could reduce the cost of transportation considerably, even rivaling the cost of public transportation,” he said. Having a consumer AV will be “completely disruptive,” he said. He thinks affordable consumer AVs at scale with Level 4 autonomy -- one notch down from full Level 5 autonomy on the Society of Automotive Engineers scale (see 1702220011) -- will be possible in 2025, he said. “We’ll have a number of years of practicing from a regulatory point of view. Regulation is critical here. It’s difficult to leap directly to a consumer level from a regulatory point of view. Going through a regulation of a fleet is much easier.”

With the global pandemic sidelining CES as a physical show for the first time in its 54-year history, it was inevitable that exhibitors would use their Media Day news conference slots to trumpet company innovations designed to curb the airborne transmission of dangerous pathogens, even if the inventions were originally engineered for applications other than COVID-19 mitigation. “Products and solutions that were created for one use have been reimagined to address the current environment and consumer concerns around health issues,” said Panasonic North America CEO Michael Moskowitz. Panasonic Avionics developed “air purification” solutions for commercial aircraft that now “transcend air travel,” including for use in cars, hotels, homes, trains and elevators, he said. The technology generates “hydroxyl radicals” that have been proven effective to inhibit bacteria growth and viruses, he said. Recent lab studies found hydroxyl radicals “contained in ionized water particles” can thwart the spread of COVID-19, he said. “Nothing would make me happier than for all of us to be together today” at a physical CES in Las Vegas, said Moskowitz. The news conference featured a brief video message from International Olympic Committee Chairman Thomas Bach, touting that the postponed Tokyo Olympics 2020 would proceed as planned as a rescheduled physical event in July. “See you in Tokyo,” said Bach. Panasonic is a flagship global Olympics sponsor.