Polyester Film Substrates for Flexible Hybrid Electronics

Continued advances in Flexible Hybrid Electronics have required material suppliers to deliver improved functionality to the device developers in broad applications such as displays, TFT backplanes, barrier films, sensors, photovoltaics, medical diagnostics, consumer electronics, and HMI (Human Machine Interface). Demands on the film substrate suppliers can vary widely, and polymer property requirements typically include smooth surfaces with low surface defects, optically clear films with low haze and iridescence, high-temperature processing to enable solder reflow, near-zero thermal shrinkage for multilayer print registration, UV and Hydrolysis resistance, and VTM-0 Flame Retardance. Many requests also include an ability to tailor the surface chemistry to improve and enhance the downstream processing performance. New commercial polyester film types have been introduced, and their typical end-use applications will be described. In summary, polyester films are uniquely capable of offering customized and affordable substrate solutions for many flexible electronics applications.