Plasma Display Pioneer
This photo of Bob was taken in 1996 just after Panasonic purchased Plasmaco. Panasonic published this photo in a brochure highlighting USA divisions. Subsequently, this photo was featured on the cover of Information Display Magazine in July of 1997.
The plasma display in the foreground is the 21" PDP developed by Plasmaco. At the time, Bob was responsible for the panel, power electronics and circuit board designs. The 21" PDP featured Bob's patented "loop electrodes" and closed loop control of energy recovery circuits. Loop electrodes allowed Plasmaco to produce 21" panels without using costly Indium Tin Oxide (ITO). Bob's closed loop control technique for PDP sustain drivers was used on each sustain circuit design produced by Plasmaco. This technique offered precise control of the high power sustain driver for improved efficiency and reliability.
In the background stands the 42" "Fence Electrode" panel designed at Plasmaco. Bob developed fence electrodes with contrast enhancement bars to span the large pixel size of the 42" panel while improving the optical characteristics of the display. This electrode structure was later used by Samsung in a 102" PDP prototype display shown at SID in 2004.
Career Highlights
Robert G. Marcotte is a well respected member of the plasma TV development community for his accomplishments. Bob's imagination and persistence lead to the development of 10+ US and foreign patents in the field of plasma display technology. He has led both research and product development projects and continues to be a circuit designer and technology consultant. Mr. Marcotte has several US patents pending for plasma and other new technologies.
Mr. Marcotte graduated from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in 1983 with a bachelors degree in electrical engineering. He joined Plasmaco, Inc. in 1991 as a research and development engineer. Panasonic purchased Plasmaco in 1996 for the intellectual property developed. Specifically, Mr. Marcotte and his colleagues developed the first PDP driving waveforms and power electronics that offered high contrast ratios. This core technology is now present in all plasma TVs.
Under leadership of Panasonic, Plasmaco provided a number of successful contributions to the PDP community. Most notably, Mr. Marcotte devised multiple electrode structures that allowed Plasmaco to produce low cost panels that avoided the commonly used Indium Tin Oxide (ITO) transparent electrode process. He was inextricably linked to these new electrodes, their manufacturing processes and their operating plasma physics. Mr. Marcotte has traveled worldwide to educate his colleagues about his innovations.
Robert G. Marcotte's Patent Portfolio
| Patents owned by Mr. Marcotte | |
| 8,493,773 | Memory Based Illumination Device |
| Pat.Pending | Others are in process |
| 20130057176 | Discharge Device Driving Method |
| 20130103727 | Accessible Information System |
| Unpublished | Breakover Conduction Driving Method |
| Patents assigned to Panasonic | |
| 7,330,166 | Plasma display with split electrodes |
| 7,323,822 | Plasma display with split electrodes |
| 7,268,749 | Suppression of vertical crosstalk in a plasma display panel |
| 6,853,144 | Plasma display with split electrodes |
| 6,850,213 | Energy recovery circuit for driving a capacitive load |
| 6,693,389 | Suppression of vertical crosstalk in a plasma display panel |
| 6,411,035 | AC plasma display with apertured electrodes |
| 6,118,214 | AC plasma display with apertured electrodes |
| 5,998,935 | AC plasma display with dual discharge sites and contrast enhancement bars |
| 5,852,347 | Large area AC plasma display employing dual discharge sites at each pixel site |
| 5,642,018 | Display panel sustain circuit enabling precise control of energy recovery |