By KEN LIU Despite lukewarm sales this April, leading Taiwanese LED makers are optimistic about the market prospect for this year and beyond, citing several recent developments that they believe will help boost their sales. These developments include the March 11 Sendai earthquake and tsunami, an agreement between Taiwan and mainland China on co-developing industry standards for LED manufa...

One relatively new application is LED agricultural lighting Due to the lack of global consensus in standards and high production cost initially, LED lighting does not project bright market prospect in the short term, especially as a form of popular lighting. However, many LED lighting companies are working on innovative applications to enhance the diversity of LED lighting, hence broadening ...

Chinese makers are actively developing higher-end indoor LED lighting applications LED lighting has been moving indoors in recent years, and many of China’s lighting manufacturers have launched indoor LED lights that feature high brightness, low heat, long life, and recyclability. The United States and Japan currently monopolize LED chip technology and equipment, while Europe is su...

Taiwan’s ITRI general director advises LED industry to build industry alliances When Unimicorn Corp., United Microelectronics Corp.’s (UMC) printed-circuit board subsidiary, announced in late 2010 its investment in LED-luminaire maker NeoPac Lighting (Zhongshan) Ltd., it was the highlight of what many big LED-lighting operators had been competing to achieve: Setting up integrated LED manufactu...

One magnetic-related technology is being developed to raise LED output Over the past year, Taiwan’s government-backed Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) has introduced several LED (light emitting diode) technologies that can help to enhance local LED-lighting manufacturers’ cost efficiency, product performance, durability, innovation and user friendliness. One notable technolo...

The silicon-backed packaging approach features prime advantage of efficient thermal conductivity Silicon Base Development Inc. (SiBDI) uses a unique packaging method for its light-emitting diodes (LEDs), involving the fixing of an LED epitaxy layer onto a flexible copper-alloy sheet that is, in turn, fixed to a 200mm silicon wafer. The LED packager, based in Taoyuan, Taiwan, has borrow...

The next five years are critical for the development of LED lighting on both sides of Strait The 12th five-year national development plan that the Beijing authority announced last October, effective from the beginning of this year, to urbanize rural areas, upgrade industries and develop strategic industries such as new information technology (mainly associated with advanced Internet technology...

Demand for LED bulbs to surge by 2013 due to incandescent phase-out Digitimes Research, a Taiwan-based consulting firm tracking information-technology markets, estimates the output value of the LED (light emitting diode) light bulbs is likely to account for approximately 10%, or US$8 billion, of the total for the global lighting industry in 2011, surging from 2010's share of 3.2%. Mean...

One packager believes newcomers are kept at bay by high startup cost Over the past few years, simplicity has dominated the design trend of the light emitting diode (LED) packaging industry, motivating manufacturers to minimize the packaging layers as they reduce thermal-resistance factors alongside increasing power input. In the past, thermal-conductivity methodologies were less effi...

A Singaporean firm launches infrared-activated LED lighting for cabinets One of the future trends to enhance LED (light emitting diode) lighting is computerization, programming to tweak dimming capacity and color variation to make the lights more intelligent, or shaping their behavior according to ambient conditions to save energy. As with many other computerized systems that intervene...