LED Lighting Basks in the Spotlight

Photonics festival attracts buyers from around the world

Photonics Festival Taiwan 2012 was held at the Nankang Exhibition Hall of Taipei World Trade Center (TWTC) on June 19-21, bearing the theme of "Living Green." And the show's organizer, Photonics Industry & Technology Development Association (PIDA), was upbeat about Taiwan's photo-electronics industry's future.

"The industry has been developing in Taiwan for more than three decades, and this year's annual output may be around NT$2.2 trillion (or US$73.3 billion)," said Shih Ta-cheng, chairman of the show's preparatory committee.

LED, solar energy and optical parts are the three sectors of Taiwan's photo-electronics industry that maintain the country among the top three in the world in terms of annual output.

"Since its inception in 1991, Photonics Festival has gradually expanded by combining related activities and has become a major annual event for the photo-electronics industry," Shih said.

This year's Photonics Festival consisted of several shows that included the 21st Opto Taiwan, the 8th LED Lighting Taiwan, the 6th Solar Taiwan, the 6th Optocomm Taiwan and the 3rd Cross-Straits Optonics. According to PIDA, Photonics Festival Taiwan 2012 is the largest ever, intended to brighten what had been the gloomy sentiment in the market.

LED Lighting Taiwan gathered Taiwan's top LED lighting makers and attracted buyers from the world. Nearly 40 foreign buyers from over 10 countries attended this LED exhibition, according to PIDA.

"Taiwan's LED lighting manufacturers are mostly engaged in R&D to launch their own innovative products, which marks a different path from the traditional original equipment manufacturing (OEM) production model," Shih said. Most of Taiwan's leading LED manufacturers are creating their products' distribution channels to market them under their own brand names such as Everlight Electronics, Top Energy Saving System Corp. (TESS), China Electric MFG. Corp., Delta Electronics, Star Comgistics Capital, BenQ, Nan Ya Photonics, Tatung and WINTEK Corporation.

LED Summit
During the show PIDA held the LED Summit Meeting, with top executives of member companies participating to help LED companies address the industrial and market trend.

"While the LED substitutes traditional bulbs as an energy-saving lighting source, it also provides opportunities for lighting companies to innovatively manufacture higher value-added products," said Lite-On group Vice President Wu Hsiang-rui. For example, the annual "Lite-On Award" competition includes innovative LED lighting products every year. Among this year's 12 award winners are several LED products. One of these award winners is "The “Halved Again," a traffic light that thanks to the innovative structure of its reflective lens is supposed to consume half the energy of common energy-saving traffic lights. A second award winner is the "The LED Playground," designed to take advantage of LED lighting in color-switching control. Another winner is the "Transformer," featuring an innovative module design that helps disperse heat and reduce material costs simultaneously.

"PIDA's LED lighting show is a critical event for Taiwan's industry since it gathers Taiwan's top LED companies and serves as a bridge between them, the government and consumers," said an Epistar executive. A Taiwan Philips representative said that LED lighting products should be used more extensively at government office buildings and government-run institutions to lead by example and reinforce the energy-saving lighting trend among the public.

"Most consumers still hesitate to buy LED lighting products primarily because of the high price," said Tsao Ching-tang, sales representative of American Cree. "While LED lighting makers strive to meet consumers' demands by reducing material and production costs, they should also consider broadening the application of LED lighting to explore hidden business opportunities."

Most LED companies have cut their product prices to different degrees in reaction to the gloomy market sentiment, and this year's annual LED sales may reach 1.05 million, up by around 2.7 times from last year, according to PIDA data.

Diverse Products
This year LED Lighting Taiwan showcased a comprehensive range of LED products: besides street lamps, tunnel lights, architecture lighting and other professionally used lighting products, there was also special lighting such as solar-energy lighting, flashlights, down lights, spot lighting, showcase lamps, stage lights, as well as other commercial and residential lighting products.

Everlight Electronics, one of the leading LED lighting manufacturers in Taiwan, introduced a wide-angle LED bulb at the show. "This wide-angle LED bulb, besides its energy-saving advantage, is closer to traditional lighting sources in terms of price and illumination quality," said company Assistant Vice President Hsu Shi-chuan. Since the wide-angle LED bulb is supposed to be suitable for both outdoor and indoor lighting products, Hsu is very upbeat about the prospects for LED lighting in the near future. "In the years to come LED lighting will expand its market share at an accelerated pace."

Forward Electronic of the Tatung Group introduced its highly energy-efficient street lamp series that has been selling steadily in both Taiwan and abroad through the group's distribution channels. Its 12W LED bulb (up to 1.300lm per watt), more energy efficient than average bulbs, has set a high energy-efficiency benchmark for the LED lighting market, the company says. "We have changed from being an OEM manufacturer to a branded one that has the support of our competent R&D," said company President Hsu Meng-chi. Besides common LED lighting and LED back light modules, Forward Electronics also manufactures LED auto lamps and has attained a certain market share in China.

ADO Optronics introduced several new LED lighting items at the show, including RGB Shaface Lights that are powered by the DMX512 module and feature seven different lighting effects suitable for special lighting.

Aether Systems Inc. introduced its newly developed LED bulbs that are supposed to be suitable for crystal lighting, which requires brighter and shinier illumination in order to present the high quality of sparkling crystal. "Many crystal lighting lovers have been disappointed that major countries worldwide announced policies to prohibit the use of traditional tungsten bulbs since they consider that the traditional tungsten bulbs better present the quality of crystal lighting.

Aether Systems focused its R&D on making the LED bulbs better match the crystal lighting and introduced several bulbs that are supposed to perform much better than common ones when used for crystal lighting. However, the company admits that there is still room for improvement and its R&D will concentrate on this in the coming years.

LED Farmland
At this year's LED Lighting Show there was a special pavilion called LED Farmland where the use of LED as a lighting source for farming was demonstrated. Most LED farming focuses on indoor lighting. Su Hui-ying, assistant vice president of NanoBio Light, which is dedicated to offering LED farming techniques, said that "increasing numbers of LED lighting for farming suppliers are optimistic that artificial farming techniques can overcome the limitation of natural resources. In fact, considering the island's strengths in both farming techniques and LED production, this could be a very suitable new sector for Taiwan to develop."

"To meet the different lighting demands of different plants, we use LED bulbs of a variety of lighting colors," Su said. "We strictly control the environment of the soil and if necessary use a sponge soaked with nutritious liquid to replace natural soil." This is how pesticide use is prevented and how the harm caused by contaminated soil is avoided. Artificial soil helps people to control farming production, Su said.

"Artificial soil helps to ensure hygienic conditions and safe vegetables and fruits," said Vegfab, the largest LED farming technology supplier in Taiwan that claims to have passed the SGS 202 farming security test.

Vegfab develops various sizes of LED solutions for the use of households, restaurants and large farms while also reducing costs to make it more affordable to the public.

OLED Lighting
Photonics Festival Taiwan 2012 also featured AMOLED (active-matrix organic light-emitting diode), a display technology used in mobile devices and televisions. This was the first time that AMOLED Area was part of the show and attracted the attention of major companies from Taiwan, Japan and South Korea which introduced their newly developed products and technologies there.

TOLED is the new generation of monitor panel, according to exhibitors. It is another kind of solid-state lighting (SSL) that has great potential to challenge LED as an energy-saving alternative. "OLED has a significant advantage over LED in that it won't generate as high a temperature," said Kuo Tsling, a senior research fellow at PIDA. Also, OLED doesn't need a glass tube, transformer, or reflective lens, which makes it an economical alternative to LED. Kuo said he anticipates that OLED will be applied to lighting products no later than 2015 and that then it may cause another drastic change in the international lighting market.