On May 17th, Visionox (Gu'an) 6th-generation fully flexible AMOLED (active-matrix organic light emitting diode) production line, China's first 6th-generation fully flexible AMOLED production line, was put into operation in Gu'an New Industry City in Hebei Province. Featuring a designed productivity of 30,000 substrates per month, the production line can meet the display demands of approximately 100 million intelligent terminal devices.

Major Chinese LED package supplier MLS teams up with Taiwanese auto lamp manufacturers to develop automotive lighting. Targets of its early stage development are aftermarkets of rear lamp and turn signal in Taiwan.

According to media reports, Huawei, OPPO and Xiaomi are worried about insufficient OLED panel production, so they plan to use Mini LED-lit LCD displays for their smartphones in 2H18. Despite the fact that this rumor is not confirmed yet, the LED supply chain already pins its hope on Mini LED.

The TFT-LCD market has already become a red ocean. Korea and Japan take the lead in the OLED market. In terms of display technologies, Taiwan should seize the chance to pioneer the development of Micro LED if it wants to secure a competitive share in the global display market in the future.

Chinese LED maker HC Semitek announced it has signed an investment framework agreement to establish projects of advanced semiconductors and devices in the Yiwu Information and Optoelectronics Hi-Tech Industrial Park. The signing of the agreement was witnessed by the Yiwu Municipal People’s Government.

Multinational electronics company Panasonic will start growing and marketing high-value vegetables in China from March 2018 with its vertical farm in Suzhou. Those vegetables will be made into salads and sold to up to 30 shops in Suzhou and Shanghai.

Eric Rondolat, CEO of Philips Lighting, talked briefly about the lighting market in the US during an interview with CNBC.

Seeing a future with IoT Technology gradually maturing, Lite-On Technology is making a big push into automotive IoT and smart traffic systems and will showcase its products in January at CES 2018. It has comprehensive 802.11P solutions and is developing solutions that meet the LTE-Vehicular mobile standard.

After carrying out its capacity expansion plans, major Chinese display maker BOE is reported to share the information about two of its new OLED production lines to Apple in order to win orders from the latter.

Guangdong Rongwen Energy Technology Group (Rongwen) and Silver Spring Networks announced their selection to connect smart LED street lights in Guangzhou, China at Smart City Expo World Congress. 

China's first Gen6 flexible AMOLED line - BOE Chengdu Gen6 flexible AMOLED production line, on October 26, has put into mass production ahead of schedule. The production line's mass production and products delivery indicate that Chinese enterprises begin to lead the development of the global AMOLED industry in the new display era.

Veeco Instruments announced that it has shipped multiple TurboDisc® EPIK® 868 Gallium Nitride (GaN) Metal Organic Chemical Vapor Deposition (MOCVD) systems to several leading Chinese LED manufacturers for the production of light emitting diodes (LEDs) for solid statelighting applications.

Osram Opto Semiconductors successfully held a breaking ground ceremony for Wuxi factory's phase two expansion project in the Wuxi High-Tech Industrial Development Zone on August 8th.

On May 22, San'an Optoelectronics Co., Ltd announced its wholly owned daughter company, Sanan Optoelectronics Hong Kong Company Limited would set up a subsidiary in the USA with its own funding of USD 10 million. This US-based firm would mostly focus on research, development, manufacture, and distribution of visible light communication (VLC) technology.

1H17 has been a hectic time for the LED industry, especially for Chinese up- and midstream manufacturers. The recouping demand lightened up the market sentiment and many A-list companies reported their large investments which LEDinside would like to share with you here.

At this moment in the history of the LED industry, we have already witnessed it passed into the maturity stage, struggled to revive by finding new beachhead markets (and it succeeded), and advanced its production, ready to embrace future business possibilities. LED chip manufacturers and packagers worldwide have now been gradually shifting their focus to develop products for niche markets, including UV LED, IR LED, automotive, horticultural, and even smart lighting.

The 22nd edition of the Guangzhou International Lighting Exhibition (GILE), the most influential and comprehensive lighting and LED event in Asia, has just ended on June 12th 2017 in Guangzhou. Shanghai Wellmax Lighting Industry Co. (WELLMAX), as the industry-wide renowned “LED Bulb Expert” exhibited the trendiest and the best-selling products during the four-day fair, gathering international buyer and media attentions.

It is inevitable to find some exhibitors keep harping on the same old products at a tremendous lighting exposition as GILE 2017 (of course it is for they were there to trade), but it is also fairly reasonable to spot something new, let alone when walking around in the hall of LED chips and packages (of which the market is now a deep red ocean in China).

In order to know what oversea buyers consider the biggest obstacles they face when sourcing from China, we surveyed over 100 professional international buyers over the past several months and asked them “What is your biggest procurement challenge when buying in China?” It turned out that amongst the most frequent answers, such as quality control issue, supplier relationship management or product certification issues, the top rated one are all supply-chain related challenges. 

Chinese M&A boom has faced regulatory hurdles and crackdown at home and abroad. According to the latest report by global law firm Linklaters, as many as one third of Chinese overseas M&A deals by value were cancelled in 2016.

As LED market penetration rate continues to increase, global LED market growth has slowed down in recent years. In China, domestic LED chip manufacturers have exceeded a dominant 70% market share. In addition, global companies have increased their packaging capacity in China. It is expected that Chinese LED packaging manufacturers will continue to expand production capacity in 2017.

Due to recent pollution crackdown by Chinese authorities, the steel industry in China has halt production and undergone consolidation, leading to a dramatic price surge in steel products. As a result, prices of LED chip and packages have also increased, further resulting in a price hike in LED end products.

Big Chinese smartphone brands bullish revenue growth targets for 2016-2017 could cause oversupply of unsold phones, warned a Morgan Stanley analyst.

Laser diode is a next generation lighting technology incubating in Shenzhen, China, giving hope that the region will emerge as a leading international laser lighting player soon.

Early in May, Luxlite, Epistar's sole distributor in China, has sent out an announcement of price adjustment, listing a number of reasons for price increase, including continuingly increased raw materials and manpower costs.  （Official announcements from Luxlite, Smalit and Rishang regarding the rise of LED package price） Chinese LED chips manufacturers San’an Opto and HC Semitek followed suit Epistar’s lead in raising LED chip prices, which was considered as an early sign of recovery from the heated price war since 2014. Major...

China’s LED lighting market value will surpass RMB 500 billion (US $72.45 billion) by 2016, said Ling Wu, the Secretary General of China’s International Solid State Alliance (ISA).

New technology revolutions and industry evolutions are creating opportunities, developments in China and internationally are undergoing metamorphosis that are reshaping industry developments, said Jianlin Cao, a former Vice Minister of China’s Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST).

Growing number of Chinese smartphone makers are raising investments in OLED panels, including BOE Technology Group and six other major local players have constructed new factories and invested in total more than 2 trillion Japanese Yen (US $9 billion), reported Nikkei Asian Review.

Xiaolan, a small town with a population of 157,000 residents located in Guangdong Province in Southern China has seen its LED industry market value balloon in a short span of 8-years, reported Zhongshan Daily.

Jiangxi Luye Auto Lighting launched the first automotive lighting LED module plant in Nanchang Optical Valley in China, reported Xinhua.