Liquavista

Liquavista's technology, known as Electrowetting, was once considered the 'Holy Grail' of mobile screens. The idea was to use a small electric charge to expand or contract a drop of colored oil in every pixel. This would allow for a screen that reflected sunlight (like paper) but could also show full-motion video (like a TV). It promised a color Kindle that didn't need a backlight and could last for weeks on a single charge. The Corporate Carousel The startup's journey was a textbook case of being 'passed around.' Originally a Philips spin-off, it was acquired by Samsung in 2011, who hoped to use it for a new generation of tablets. Just two years later, Samsung sold it to Amazon. For Amazon, Liquavista represented a chance to own its own display IP and stop relying on E-Ink Holdings, its primary screen supplier. The Manufacturing Mirage Between 2013 and 2018, Liquavista operated in total secrecy under Amazon's 'Lab126' hardware division. Rumors frequently circulated that a 'Liquavista Kindle' was months away. However, the reality was a constant battle with manufacturing physics. Electrowetting displays are notoriously sensitive to temperature changes and physical impact. Every time Amazon got close to a production-ready screen, the 'yields' (the number of screens that actually worked) were too low to make the device affordable. The Final Shutdown By 2018, the display market had moved on. E-ink had improved its 'Regal' refreshing technology, and iPad screens had become significantly better in direct sunlight. Amazon realized that the billions required to build a dedicated Liquavista factory were no longer justifiable. In October 2018, Amazon quietly confirmed that Liquavista had been shuttered, and the specialized engineering team was reassigned or let go. The technology that promised to revolutionize how we read outdoors ended up as a multi-million dollar footnote in Amazon's R&D history.