LEDforum 2009 Debut – Predicting the Bright Future of the LED Industry

November 24, 2009 – The two-day LEDforum 2009 debuts today. Today’s topic is about the market trend of LED Epitaxy, packaging, and lighting. The forum focuses on the detailed analysis of LED globalization and development of lighting market. The forum also indicates that current clients’ demands have gradually shifted from brightness and cheapness in the past to high-quality, eco- and user-friendliness. Furthermore, it is projected that LEDs will be more eco-friendly in the future and the LED prices will fall to approximately 1.3 times that of traditional lamps.

In today's agenda, Epistar Vice Chairman Chao Nien Huang points out that with LED’s high efficiency, as well as long lifetime, it plays a crucial role in the lighting industry. In the future, more LED-related applications will be developed, new chips and packaging technologies will be adopted to reduce the production costs, and enhance the luminous efficacy.

Addressing the factors that drive the LED industry, CREE Vice President of Asia-Pacific Region, Soo Ghee Lee illustrates that the future industrial development depends on the market acceptance of LED’s luminous efficacy, as well as the quality and innovation of LED. In addition, energy-saving policies, such as international regulations on the brightness and safety standards of solid-state lighting, also spur the growth of the LED industry.

On the other hand, KG Cheng, Marketing Director, APAC, OSRAM Opto Semiconductors, states that judging from the current and future dynamics in the industry, it may take some time to enhance the performance of OLED, and projects that it will evolve from a high-end market to a high-volume market. Veeco Instrument Inc. Product Manager Michael Lamarra indicates, from the perspective of MOCVD equipment manufacturers, that an increasing number of LED backlight is replacing CCFL and LED lighting applications are growing rapidly; it is estimated that the cost of LED package will decline 85% in the next six years, which means that the LED manufacturers need to reduce their operating costs, while increasing their output.

As for the development of high-power UV-LED application, Dr. Chuong A.Tran, General Manager of SemiLEDs Corporation, said that the future chip development will focus more on higher performance products at lower costs. On the consumer application side, Alvin Tse, Vice President for Asia of Philips Lumileds Lighting Company, indicates that as LED has the advantage of low maintenance costs, different specifications of LED lamps will be introduced for various purposes including general household lighting, decorating lighting in hypermarkets, office lighting, industrial lighting.

Stephan Greiner, Everlight Vice President of Global Sales, who analyzes the global lighting market, said that the main lighting market concentrates in the Asia-Pacific region, accounting for 33.7% of the global market; followed by North America with 30.1%, and Western Europe with 22.3%, Eastern Europe 5.1%, while Africa and the Middle East accounts for approximately 4.5%. Overall, the estimated global market size is approximately 8.5 billion U.S. dollars. In the lighting market by applications, household applications account for 39%, followed by 18% in office and medical facilities, and the third largest market is outdoor lighting, which takes up 12%.

Stephan Greiner states that the outdoor lighting market has considerable growth potential, particularly in China’s fast-growing market, which currently accounts for 38% of the world's LED outdoor lighting, surpassing North America’s 33.3%.

LEDinside also invited guests to join Panel Discussion:(in Chinese only),they are Yi-Jen Chan Ph.D., Vice President & EOL General Director, ITRI Ruan Jun, Vice Secretary-General, China Solid State Lighting Alliance B.J.Lee Ph.D.,Chairman, Epistar Corporation Rex H.J. Wu Ph.D., General Manager, LITE-ON Technology Corp.