Shuji Nakamura, widely known as the “Thomas Edison of the LED industry” has been named a scientific adviser to the leading global LED manufacturer Seoul Semiconductor Co., Ltd.

Nakamura is a professor at the Materials Department of the College of Engineering, University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB).

He is widely known for having developed the high-brightness blue LED based on GaN in 1993 while working for Nichia Corporation in Japan. In those days, developing a blue LED was considered impossible; only red and green LEDs had been available for the prior 20 years. Prof. Nakamura’s innovation allowed LED manufacturers to produce LEDs with three primary colors (red, green and blue) which could be mixed to express 16 million colors. Perhaps most importantly, the new technology was leveraged by the LED industry to begin commercial production of white LEDs, the semiconductor ecological light source.

GaN-based white LED will be an integral part of the global wave of lighting upgrades worldwide.

Nakamura is a co-author of “The Blue Laser Diode: The Complete Story” (Springer, 2000). His work is chronicled in the book “Brilliant! Shuji Nakamura And the Revolution in Lighting Technology” by Bob Johnstone (Prometheus Books, 2007).

In 2006, Nakamura won the Millennium Technology Prize of Finland, known as “the Nobel Prize in the technology field.” In 2004, he received the Benjamin Franklin Medal in the engineering segment, previously conferred upon Thomas Edison and Albert Einstein. In addition, he won The Economist's Innovation Award, given to only six scientists who have made an outstanding contribution to innovation of technology. In 2009, he received the Harvey Prize from the Technion in Israel.

Nakamura holds B.A., M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in Electronic Engineering from the University of Tokushima, Japan. He was appointed a professor in the Materials Department at University of California, Santa Barbara, in 2000.

As a professor in the Material Department and co-director of the Solid State Lighting and Energy Center (SSLEC) at the University of California, Santa Barbara, Prof. Nakamura is leading the effort to develop the next-generation LED and Laser Diode (LD) based on the blue LED, as well as a GaN-based solar cell.

“Seoul Semiconductor Co., Ltd. is proud to be one of the industrial sponsors of the SSLEC. Prof. Nakamura’s consulting will lead Seoul Semiconductor's bright future,” Senior Vice President S.M. Lee of Seoul Semiconductor said.

Doug Hardman, North American Marketing Director for Seoul Semiconductor, said: “The legendary Professor Shuji Nakamura’s consultancy with Seoul Semiconductor is sure to accelerate our leadership position in LED technology for North America and all the world.”