Once the patent expires I expect these to be used everywhere.
It sounds true but it is inaccurate. E-Ink doesn't even make the displays. They just make the material used in the displays. The actual displays are made by sandwiching the material on TFT and other parts. The displays are made by a whole bunch of different Taiwanese vendors like AU Optronics, and others and then there's a large ecosystem over laminating them with touchscreens, different types of protective hydrobarriers and other things. The reason the panels cost more than LCDs is because the volume is not high. Go ahead, make an order for 10 million panels and specify the price like apple does, and you'll find all these manufacturers jumping to increase their production scale in order to meet your target price.
> Once the patent expires I expect these to be used everywhere.
Again, this keeps getting repeated everywhere but it is totally wrong. There's a simple question you can ask. Which patent needs to expire? The lazy answer you'll get is all 700 patents. But in reality it is not a patent that is blocking things. It is simple. Money. Would you invest hundreds of millions needed in trying to scale, improve or invent a new display technology? Or would you invest in a hot new AI/ML startup? There's your answer. For further proof, google all the dead display startup companies, to show what's really blocking the world from having a great new display technology.
I guess it's just extremely hard to compete for a beachhead against an incumbent (mobile touch displays) that's more general and mass produced.