Taiwanese semiconductor component provider TOPCO has announced that it will join the Touch Taiwan display show to introduce materials and components that are crucial for Micro LED/Mini LED technology development. 

The technology developments on wearable devices have created numerous applications with the purpose of improving the convenience and well-being of life. In the first half of 2018, several researches and projects combining LED technologies and wearables were revealed. Meanwhile, whether the new Apple Watch will adopt Micro LED has been a focus to all.

LG Innotek has reportedly launched visible LEDs for disinfection lighting which uses indoor light to deliver sterilization effect, according the report of Korea Herald. 

The UK’s Royal Navy has ordered 100,783 LED tubes worth £1 million (US$ 1.27 million) for its flagship warships from Voltacon, a UK based company.

The market value of LED lighting has continuously expanded in the past years with the progress of the technology. According to the latest report of LEDinside, LED lighting market scale will reach US$ 33.3 billion in 2019 and LED lighting market penetration will come to 63 percent in 2022 from 22 percent in 2017.

Taiwan-based flexible printed circuit board producer Uniflex announced its development of Mini LED substrates which has entered the supply chain of LED chips, LED backlight modules and panels. The company expects mass production and shipment of the products in the fourth quarter of 2018.

A research team at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has produced a fiber-based “soft hardware” with embedded LED and diode photodetectors which can be used to make clothes.

As one of the most important display shows of the industry, Touch Taiwan will take place during August 29 – 31 in Taipei, Taiwan. Manufacturers of the supply chain including LED chip, panel, driver IC and end-product applications will gather at the event to demonstrate their innovative technologies as well as to discuss the development trend of the industry. Micro LED, considered to be the next generation display technology, will be a spotlight of the event.

Cities worldwide are preparing themselves to enter the new age of IoT (Internet of Thing) through the installation of smart streetlights and the capital of Taiwan, Taipei is no exception. Taipei city has been working with Everlight, the Taiwanese LED package giant and LED lighting producer, to replace the conventional streetlights with LED smart streetlights and to integrate with different solution providers for constructing a smart city for the future. 

According to the research of LEDinside, the market scale of LED plant lighting is estimated to grow to US$ 633 million by 2022, with a CAGR of 30% during 2018-2022. Many LED producers have entered the market of horticulture lighting to share the expanding opportunities when the demands in the general lighting market are relatively weak. LEDinside has collected the updates of horticultural applications from LED firms of the world. 

Nokia has announced its commercial partnership with Current by GE for applying smart city technology to Canadian cities to improve infrastructures and citizen services.

A project named UnMast City was initiated by NGOs and supported by professionals in National Health Service in England to fight against the air pollution in London. The project highlights the toxic air crisis by designing a customized LED light mask which changes color to indicate the air quality. 

Cochlear implant is a device using electrodes to stimulate the auditory nerve to help hearing-impaired people to “hear.” But it cannot deliver complex sound as the electrode current does not move from the electrode to an auditory neuron directly. Researchers have been exploring the possibilities to replace electricity with light in cochlear implants via optogenetics technology.

After showcasing “The Wall” for the first time at CES 2018 in January, Samsung did not stop moving forward with its progress of Micro LED display. The South Korean display giant announced during a press conference that it is ready to mass produce The Wall display for both commercial and home entertainment use.

Besides display and lighting, LED technology applications in medical field have been progressing to create possibilities for curing cancer. Researchers at Waseda University, Japan have developed an implantable device consisting of LED chips and bio-adhesive nanosheet which has successfully shrank the tumors in mice through photodynamic therapy. The result was published in Nature Biomedical Engineering journal on July 16th 2018. 

Though the big brands have been focusing on Micro LED and pushing its development, currently most of the technologies of Micro LED have stayed inside the laboratories and still need further preparation before entering the mass production process. Mini LED, on the other hand, is ready to be applied and to be produced in volume, according to many LED manufactures.

The Belgium based nano-electronic center, Imec and the Taiwan based semiconductor equipment supplier Marketech International Corp are reportedly reported to collaborate for developing a testing chip implantation equipment for Micro LED manufacturing. 

Micro LEDforum 2018 was held successfully yesterday on July 12th in Taipei. Nearly 300 attendees from all over the world joined the giant annual event to learn the trends of the industry and to spark idea exchanges as well as to find the opportunities for business cooperation. LEDinside was honored to invite speakers from leading institutes including eLux, Uniquarta, QMAT, KIMM, Nitride Semiconductors, V-technology, Topcon, Macroblock, KLA, SelfArray and Jasper Display to share their technologies and insights of Micro LED. 

Lufa Farms, a Canadian food supplier based in Montreal, has collaborated with Hort Americas and Current by GE to install LED lights for maximizing the production efficiency of its hydroponic rooftop greenhouses.

The development of LED technology not only enhances the quality of life for humans but also improves the well-being of animals. One study shows that by attaching LED lights on fishing nets, it could significantly reduce the chance to bycatch birds and turtles. 

Samsung Electronics installed the a LED screen measured 7.7 meters tall and 63 meters wide in the Plaza Norte shopping mall in Lima, Peru. With the largest LED screen installed in South America, Samsung expects to expand its large-size screen into the markets. 

Emirates Airlines partnered with a U.S. based farming start-up, Crop One Holdings to construct a 12,000 square meter (130,000 square foot) vertical farming facility in Dubai for providing fresh salads for passengers. 

Automobile manufacturers have implemented optical sensors on vehicles and boosted the demands of sensors in recent years. Currently each vehicle is installed with four to five set sensing elements. It is forecasted that the number will keep growing and by 2020, every single vehicle might be installed with up to 10 sensing elements. Another major market for sensor applications is wearable devices. The market expansion of wearable devices will increase the needs of photodiode by four-fivefold.

LED applications have opened an explosive market in horticulture lighting. Nichia, the Japanese LED giant, set up a laboratorial plant factory in Shanghai to test how different LED light sources can alter the ingredients of plants to create medicinal effects. 

LED lighting is widely known for its features of energy saving, long life and sustainability, making it perfect for city lighting. Communities around the world have chosen to install LED lights to save cost and to increase the well-being of people.

At Brussels’ Zaventem Airport, a 30,000 pixel video and kinetic sculpture runs above travelers on their way the baggage reclaim hall. The installation was jointly set up by ArKaos, a real-time video processing company, and a visual designer Koert Vermeulun of creative agency ACTLD. 

London Science Museum selected White Light, a British event technology operator to manage the lighting installation in one of its gallery, Making the Modern World. SGM’s R-2 Rail lights were chosen by White Light to transform the museum gallery at night while maintaining the daylight look of the museum. 

Human Centric Lighting addresses the influences of light on the human body and is used to develop innovative lighting technologies for diminishing the negative effects of artificial lights and enhancing the wellbeing of people. Aside from the human body, scientists have also studies the impacts of artificial lights on wild animals. By looking into the ecological effects of different light through different spectrums, a research has been able to develop an approach to cut down their adverse effects on wildlife.

The market has put a spotlight on Micro LED technology since Apple acquired LuxVue. Manufacturers of the industry have collaborated to boost the momentum of Micro LED as the technology becomes more and more popular in 2017 and 2018. Besides Apple and Sony, Samsung and Foxconn are also the big names that attract most attention. 

Osram showcased its latest technology of Human Centric Lighting (HCL) with an eyewear device at Boston TechJam.