Stacked OLED microdisplay with low-voltage silicon backplane

A microdisplay comprising a light emitting OLED stack on top of a silicon-based backplane with individually addressable pixels and control circuitry wherein the light emitting OLED stack has three or more OLED units between a top electrode and a bottom electrode; and the control circuitry of the silicon-based backplane comprises at least two transistors with their channels connected in series between an external power source V DD, and the bottom electrode of the OLED stack. The light-emitting OLED stack preferably has a Vth of at least 7.5 V or more. The control circuit can include a protection circuit comprised of a p-n diode, preferably a bipolar junction transistor.