Back in 2019 Patently Apple posted  a report titled " An Apple Supplier now Delivers a Sensor Breakthrough that will Totally Eliminate the iPhone's Nasty Notch." The report noted that Apple supplier AMS provides Apple with optical sensors for 3D facial recognition in iPhones. AMS had announced at the time that new behind-the-display technology had been developed. Our 2019 report presented the image shown below of an artists rendition of an iPhone without a notch using "invisible camera" technology.

Today we're learning that Samsung Display is currently developing a new under panel camera technology for its customer Apple to hide the Face ID under the display for the iPhone 15.

According to The Elec, Samsung Display’s technology is expected to apply first to Samsung Electronics’ foldable phones launching next year, followed by application to the Pro lineup on the iPhone 15 series. Apple is planning to apply hole-display and under panel Face ID on the iPhone 15 Pro models.

Hole-display has a hole on the panel where the front camera is. The technology is already widely in use by Samsung for its Galaxy series while Apple is expected to apply them to the iPhone 14 series launching later this year.

Under panel Face ID will hide the sensor when it is not in use. This works in essence exactly like the under panel camera, or UPC, technology that Samsung Display has applied to the panels of the Galaxy Z Fold 3 that launched last year.

Samsung Display was collaborating with Canada’s OTI Lumionics for its new under panel camera technology, which will include a metal patterning layer that uses cathode mask materials. In OLED panels, the light emitted from the emission layer at the bottom goes through the cathode at the top __ this is called top emission.

(Click on image to Enlarge)

The cathode needs to be transparent for under panel camera technology to work. The cathode is patterned so that it can be transparent while being able to absorb light from the outside at the same time. For more, read the full report by The Elec.