Originally designed to offer safety for music listeners on a run, Spark Headphones has evolved into a fashionable accessory.

Researchers have developed a cheap, portable camera that can photograph the retina without the need for pupil-dilating eye drops.

Xiaomi has made its brand known in the technology industry with a multitude of products for applications over mobile phones and laptops to IoT technology and connected electronics. It would not sound as a surprise at all now Xiaomi launches its smart lighting products–Yeelight LED bulbs. In terms of personal wireless LED lighting, Xiaomi claims Yeelight LED bulb offers same quality as that of Philips Hue with more competitive CPI. The light is priced at USD 20 and is even available at discount prices on online shops such as GearBest.

Light Polymers, a nanochemistry startup with R&D operations in Silicon Valley, Taiwan and Korea, recently announced a Series A investment of $24.3 million led by a consortium of private investors.

LED lighting takes a huge share in the lighting market and the prevalence of LEDs reflects the industry has grown fairly mature. A multitude of LED types are being developed and introduced to not only illumination but other various applications. All that tells the need for LED light measurement will increase; and accurate, effective, and reliable methods are desirable when it comes to testing LEDs’ optical parameters. Here, Vektrex, a LED measurement system provider, releases three videos expounding how to improve LED light measurement by providing sustained power to LEDs, reducing junction heating to achieve a higher accuracy, and maintaining time stability.

Organized by SEMI and Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA), LED Taiwan and Taiwan International Lighting Show (TiLS) will be collocated and held on April 12-15, 2017 at Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center, Hall 1, showcasing a wide range of technology innovations and solutions in six themed pavilions.

On 10 March, over 2,000 guests from design, business, culture, politics and the media from over 40 countries celebrated the winners of the iF DESIGN AWARD 2017 at the BMW Welt in Munich. A total of 5,575 contributions from 59 countries entered the competition, and 75 of them won the coveted iF gold award, including the following three lighting products.

After the detrimental Galaxy Note 7 recall, Samsung is hoping the upcoming flagship Galaxy S8 lineup can revive its smartphone business. Meanwhile, rival Apple is prepared to launch its first OLED iPhone in September. Analysts are now saying the S8 may lose the battle against the next iPhone due to a lack of eye-catching selling points.

Taiwanese LED manufacturer BRTLED recently announced it has received a four-to-five-year-order from an US commercial airline for SMD LED lighting module, which is expected to be a major growth driver for the company.

Following launching the 10mW UVC LED products and the flowing water disinfection module at 2016, Jason Electric today announced that they have made a new breakthrough and will launch the product of 100mW UVC LED. This new product is very compact with dimension of 68mm*68mm, and can emit 275nm UVC light of 100mW. It makes it possible for designing the solution to deal with the mass flowing water and air purification application.

A new wave of LED street lights installation has started across India. According to local media, North Delhi Municipal Corporation has decided to replace over two lakh (200,000) traditional streetlights with LED lighting across its six zones. There are around 250,000 streetlights in these areas, including park lights and semi High-mast lighting.

Philips Lighting and Cerezo Osaka, the J1 League soccer club, have signed an agreement in which Philips Lighting becomes the club’s ‘official lighting partner.’ The company plans to provide design, consultancy services and advanced LED lighting technology for the club’s stadium and practice pitches. 

A research team at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) claims it has successfully developed the most energy-efficient LED filament technology with a luminous efficacy of 129lm/W, which represents 1.5 times the efficacy of traditional LED lamps, surpassing all other general lighting tools available in the market.  

South Korean lighting manufacturer Photonics Trade Group (PTG) has secured a KRW 5 billion (USD 4.32 million) deal with French luxury brand Louis Vuitton to supply indoor LED lighting, according to local media ETnews. 

Apple’s plan to adopt OLED panels for its next iPhone series has apparently led to a fierce competition between OLED makers. According to The Wall Street Journal, sources close to the matter confirmed that Japan’s Sharp will invest around 100 billion yen (USD 878 million) to expand OLED production to compete with its rival Samsung Electronics Co,.

Philips Lighting and Globus, a major grocery retailer in Germany, have measured the positive effects of lighting in a joint research project. In collaboration with German Research Center for Artificial Intellifence DFKI and EIT Digital, a series of experiments were conducted at the Globus supermarket in Saarbrücken to study the impact of different combinations of colored lighting on sales and customer behavior. 

Apple is expected to release three new iPhone models later this year, and one of them will feature an OLED display. A new report from South Korea’s The Bell on Monday further suggests that Apple plans to shift all iPhones to OLED displays by 2019.

During the 2017 Chief Analyst Market Seminar, held by LEDinside and CNLED on February 20th, when asked about the future of automotive LED lighting, C.W. Wang, Deputy Director of Automotive Lighting Department, EVERLIGHT, said, “With the adoption of LED lighting and smart technology, the car of the future is more than just transport. This is the trend in automotive LED lighting.”

Organic Response Lighting Control Systems are designed to operate wide area lighting installations with maximum energy efficiency while still maintaining a high level of comfort. The key lies in a distributed intelligence which enables the system to react to the presence of persons in the immediate vicinity, as well as to those further away.

Philips Lighting and Tarkett, a global provider of innovative and sustainable flooring, announced the launch of Luminous vinyl flooring. The specially developed vinyl tiles are embedded with cutting-edge LED technology that enables retailers to advertise, interact with customers and guide them through any store or building.

Chinese LED manufacturer, Elec-Tech International (H.K) Co, Ltd, recently signed a MoU with South Korea’s Samsung Electronics in Shenzhen, China.

Getting your hands dirty while growing plants might soon be something in the past. Aeroponics is an efficient and effective way to grow plants in an air or mist environment without soil and with very little water. It is portable and is suitable for people with limited growing space.

With about six months left before Apple unveils its next generation iPhone, the rumor mill has gone into overdrive. An article from the Wall Street Jounral suggested that Apple would adopt a curved OLED display for one of its three smartphone models this year. 

AT&T and Current, powered by GE, have announced an exclusive agreement to connect cities across the United States and Mexico to the Internet of Things (IoT). Together, the companies will unlock a realm of possibilities to improve the way cities operate, communicate and meet the needs of citizens.

The trend towards urbanization is continuing and it is projected that by 2050 nearly 70 percent of mankind will reside in urban areas. Such demographic changes will impact on a city’s infrastructure, driving requirements for smarter, more secure and energy-efficient solutions. Infineon Technologies AG and eluminocity GmbH have jointly developed an intelligent streetlight to tackle these requirements. In promoting e-mobility, helping to save energy and enabling a connected infrastructure, the streetlight can serve as the backbone for the city of the future.

Internet of Things pioneer Echelon Corporation is expanding its successful deployment of “white tunable” connected street lighting in White Bear Lake, Minnesota with weather adaptive capabilities powered by its collaboration with IBM Watson Internet of Things (IoT).

Osram Opto Semiconductors’ new SFH 4787S infrared LED (IRED) for iris scanners illuminates the eyes so evenly that the software identifying the iris pattern now hardly needs to correct artefacts. 

Philips Lighting and Ericsson jointly introduced today a new smart pole, Philips lightpole site slim, targeted initially at European cities. Philips lightpole site combines Philips’ energy efficient LED lighting with Ericsson’s leading small cell technology for high-speed broadband connectivity.

According to the latest evaluation, the US $29.6 billion global LED lighting market is expected to reach up to  US $ 33.1 billion by the end of 2017. The credit for the appraisal goes to the regional lighting development as LED lighting accounts for 23% of total lightings in Europe, which is the highest across the world. Also, North America and China are the second and third highest absorbing regions respectively.

At the 2017 Smart City Summit and Expo, held in Taipei, Taiwan, connected lighting is one important trend that cannot be overemphasized. Philips Lighting, the Dutch lighting giant, presented an integrated smart lighting solution to showcase its resolution to compete in this market.