Automotive applications including exterior/interior lighting and displays are the targeted area of several LED companies. Rising development of alternative fuel vehicles and self-driving technology push the deployment of LEDs in automobile as the features of higher lifetime and lower energy consumption have become even more critical. As results, several Taiwan-based LED companies have deepened their engagement in automotive LED applications, focusing lighting, sensing technology and display. Tesla supplier EOI continues to expand its automotive product portfolio and...

Smart glasses and AR devices have been targeted by Micro LED display technology and were considered to be the first applications entering the market. Previously LEDinside has collected news about Apple’s patent applications related to Micro LED and AR smart glasses. However, rumors said that Apple might have dropped its AR glasses project. Apple’s project of AR/VR headset development might have been suspended due to immature capability of building 5G connectivity and data, according to the report of Digitimes. The report said that the team was dis...

Osram announced that it Austrian company ams has approached with the interest of a public takeover of Osram with a value of EUR 38.50 (US$ 43.36) per share. However, right after Osram’s announcement, ams decided to withdraw the offer as the company did not see “sufficient basis” for continually talking with Osram. According to Osram, ams showed the interest of acquiring Osram by EUR 38.5 per share. The announcement noticed that to support the offer, ams will need a temporary bridge-loan facility of EUR 4.2 billion (US$ 4.73 billion) and a capital i...

Last week LEDinside reported that more and more vertical farming startups have received funds from worldwide investors, marking the great potential of the high-tech farming business. Within a week, another US-based vertical farming company, AeroFarms, announced that it has raised US$ 100 million in the Series E funding round. According to the report by the Financial Times, the funding round was led by IKEA’s parent company, Ingka Group, bringing the total funding to US$ 238 million. Other investors include Wheatsheaf, ADM Capital, Mission Point Cap...

Vertically integrated LED manufacturer Lextar released its revenue of June 2019, which came to NT$845 million (US$27.2 million), up by 15.1% MoM and down by 7.02% YoY. Lextar began restructure in 2018 by drastically cutting off fixtures business and turning into high margin products including Mini LED backlight, display, automotive products and other. Currently, the company is processing Mini LED shipment steadily and plans to increase the share of Mini LED backlight product to 10% by the fourth quarter of 2019. It was also reported that panel manufacture...

In 2008, MEAN WELL officially released the first LED power supply – CLG-150 series and stepped into the potential LED market. Until now, the selling quantity of LED related products is uncountable. Having a special opportunity, MEAN WELL received several pieces of the CLG-150 products which were manufactured in 2008. A detailed investigation and analysis were executed, and the result is shared below. The number of the components could be from dozens to hundreds depends on the wattage and topology of power supply. Each component is applied to the ...

Seoul Semiconductor (Seoul) filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Conrad Electronic, a European retailer of electronic products, in the District Court of Düsseldorf in Germany. Seoul reported that the LEDs in backlit mobile phones sold by Conrad are infringing the company’s patent for LED light extraction technology. The patent covers fundamental LED chip fabrication technology to extract light efficiently, significantly enhancing brightness. Conrad is currently selling hundreds of different models of Korean, U.S. and China mobile phones. Ac...

Micro LED technology breakthroughs continue to progress in order to tackle challenges occurred in different manufacture process. At Micro LEDforum 2019, professionals in industry introduced their progresses of various technologies for a wide range of Micro LED applications. Yen-Hsiang Fang at Consortium for Intelligent Micro –assembly System (CIMS) of Taiwan’s Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) presented the developments of the organization. ITRI began to build up its full color Micro LED display technology since ...

With its expertise in Micro/Mini LED display and fine-pitch display, LED driver IC company Macroblock sees profit growth in 3Q19 despite that tepid Chinese Market. The increasing demands of fine-pitch LED display and Mini LED backlight display pushed Macroblock’s revenue for 2Q19. With orders for niche products, profit margin of the company may come to 35 percent. For Mini LED backlight, Macroblock has expanded the product portfolio from driver IC to module, providing holistic solutions for clients. New equipment will be installed in 3Q19 and prod...

LEDinside’s annual event, Micro LEDforum, has again gathered many experts in the industry and academia to share about their technological expertise and provide penetrating insights of products and applications in the current Micro LED landscape. The event started with Roger Chu, Research Director of LEDinside, delved into the development of the panel industry. He pointed out that panel production has outpaced market demand, causing furious competition and pushing manufacturers to focus on developing new display technology or improving the functionalities of the...

The US International Trade Commission has concluded a patent infringement investigation according to the complaint filed by Philips Lighting (now named Signify) in 2017. The Commission ruled Feit Electric Company, Lowe’s Companies and Satco did not infringe Philips Lighting’s patents but ruled against MSi Lighting, reported lightED magazine. In 2017, Philips Lighting filed a complaint accusing nine lighting companies of infringing its patents. The accused companies included members of the National Association of Electrical Distributors (NAE...

The expanding horticulture LED lighting business marks the development of high-tech farming including vertical farming which has attracted increasing investment recently. Vertical farming companies from Europe and the US have reported funds from worldwide investors. Berlin-based vertical farming startup InFarm has raised a US$100 billion fund in its Series B investment led by Atomico with other existing investors including Balderton Capital, Astanor Ventures, Cherry Ventures and TriplePoint Capital joining. Founded in 2013, the Germany company has developed the ...

Soon after Osram’s announcement of the bidding offer from Bain Capital and the Carlyle Group, the German company said that it will support the public takeover offer. On July 4th, Osram announced that its Managing Board and Supervisory Board decided to support the legally binding transaction offer for the public takeover of all the shares of Osram by Bain Capital and the Carlyle Group. Osram and the consortium have also concluded an investor agreement that includes comprehensive commitments. “Bain and Carlyle are the right partners for Osram at the rig...

Osram announced a confirmation of receiving a binding offer from Bain Capital and The Carlyle Group, the US-based private equity firms who have been in talk with the German company for a buyout since the end of 2018. According to Osram, the inventors have offered an amount of EUR 35 (US$39.5) per share for the buyout, which will be approximately 3.4 billion euro ($3.8 billion) for concluding the investor agreement and to make a public takeover offer. Osram said, “The responsible decision bodies will discuss and decide on this offer shortly.” Osram has b...

LEDinside, a division of TrendForce, holds the annual pivotal conference, Micro LEDforum 2019: Key Technology and Application Market, yesterday (July 2nd) at the National Taiwan University Hospital International Convention Center. Invited were Rohinni, TORAY, Konica Minolta, PARC, Plessey, Kyung Hee University, Macroblock, Ultra Display, the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) and other leading manufacturers and experts at home and abroad to give penetrating analyses into the breakthroughs, applications and business opportunities o...

China’s biggest LED chip maker Sanan Optoelectronics was removed from the red-flag list of “unverified” entities by the U.S. last week along with other seven Chinese companies. On April 10th, 2019, the U.S. Commerce Department added 37 Chinese companies and research organizations including Sanan Optoelectronics to a red-flag list of “unverified” entities and warned that companies in the U.S. should be caution when dealing with the listed organizations. After the list came to effect, semiconductor equipment supplier Applied Materials h...

Congratulations Macroblock on 20th anniversary! Our 20th anniversary is an opportunity to honor to celebrate and look ahead to what's next. We celebrated our 20th anniversary with a grand event addressing the future of micro-LED technology development and highlighting its contribution as a key to the next five years. This event is held on 27th of June at Shangri-La's Far Eastern Plaza Hotel in Taipei and offering full-day sessions. "In honor of celebrating Macroblock 20th anniversary, we hold this forum for ‘Next Five Years of LED Display Techn...

Micro LED technology is on its way of business transforming! Since last year, we have seen different Micro LED display products in various trade shows from worldwide companies. Although Micro LED technology is still fraught with myriad challenges, it has become much more developed than it was two years ago. Schedules for the commercialization of Micro LEDs will unfold as the technology matures, predicted to bring Micro LED market revenue up to US$4.2 billion by 2023. This year, LEDinside Micro LEDforum 2019 has invited professionals across the world to sha...

Osram moved a step forwards to its transformation to a high-tech company by selling its Siteco luminaires business to Stern Steward Capital, the investment arm of Stern Steward & Co. based in Munich. According to Osram, “Separation from Osram gives Siteco entrepreneurial freedom,” and Stern Stewart Capital will continue the current transformation approach. Despite that the financial details of the transaction were not revealed by both parties, Osram noted that its cost situation would also be improved with the elimination of previous Group structures. ...

Continental, the German automotive manufacturing company, announced its collaboration with Leia, a Silicon Velley company for developing light-field automotive displays to show 3D information around vehicles. Through the partnership, Continental aims to develop a new light-field cockpit solution, the Natural 3D Lightfield Instrument Cluster, which, according to the company, is an evolutionary step in the design of the human-machine interaction within automotive vehicles. (Image: Continental) According to Continental and Leia, the concept of the new light-field solu...

Taiwan-based LED chip maker Epistar held its annual shareholder meeting on June 19, 2019. The company expects that Mini LED products will be the major driving momentum in 2019. Epistar continues to work on high margin LED products including UV LED, VCSEL, Mini LED and Micro LED. The company is working intensively with Mini LED projects and its products have been adopted in the end applications including monitors, notebooks and tablets. Epistar foresees an increase of product shipment with rising demands in the market 2020, which will push the produ...

Samsung is increasing visibility worldwide with its display technology. The Korean giant has completed a massive LED displays installation at One Time Squire building in New York City and announced expansion of its Onyx Cinema LED adoption in Texas, USA. (Image: Samsung) Samsung’s new displays at One Times Square take up the entire front facing panel which together measured more than 1,081 square meters (11,639 square feet). The displays feature premium center-stage exposure with full motion video, live-streaming and interactive capabilities. The inst...

After lots of talking about visible lighting communication, or LiFi (Light Fidelity), Signify announced the launch of Trulifi, a new range of LiFi systems. The world’s largest lighting company also reported two new customers of the systems. According to Signify, the LiFi systems, branded Trulifi, leverage existing and future professional luminaires for fast and reliable data transmission. Trulifi uses optical wireless transceiver technology built, or retrofitted, into Philips luminaires. Customers can use their current lighting infrastructure to power wireless conn...

Luminaires manufacturers and LED power suppliers in the UK and US companies are merging to speed up LED lighting applications and overcome difficulties in the industry. ERP Power, a portfolio company of Angeles Equity Partners who provide connected LED drivers for the lighting industry, announced the acquisition of Lumenetix. Lumenetix had developed tunable color light engines and digital controls designed to deliver interactive lighting experiences. With the acquisition, ERP aims to combine its power control and Lumenetix’ tunable light to reduce origina...

China LED company Shineon presented its Micro LED display at GILE 2019 with its new brand “IconiView” targeting high-end display products. The 139-inch 4K Micro LED display was developed by Shineon and Lumens, using Flip-Chip-on-Module (COM) technology with a pixel density of 1,570,900 pixel/m2. The display achieved a contrast ratio of 3000:1 and its brightness is over 2000nit. According to Shineon, the product has been verified and can be mass produced. Shineon said it has been developing laser-lift-off thin-film LED technology which i...

Micro LED and Mini LED products are going to be the spot lights at this year’s Touch Taiwan, the Taiwan-based display show which will take place in Taipei, Taiwan during August 28 to 30. Micro LED is regarded the next generation display technology with its excellent performance including high brightness, high contrast, low power consumption and long lifetime which suppress OLED. Despite that several manufacturing barriers have slow down the commercialization process of Micro LED, worldwide technology developers have teamed up to leverage their expertise in...

Horticultural applications of LED lighting are the current trend in the lighting industry. Leading companies around the world have been developing different products to meet the increasing demands. As worldwide need for healthy, fresh food continues to grow, greenhouse growers require efficient, effective lighting to enable year-round growing. Current, powered by GE announced the release of the Arize Element Top Light, the industry’s first one-for-one LED replacement for 1000W High Pressure Sodium (HPS) products. The Arize Element features multiple light...

Cree announced an update to its financial guidance for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2019. The company modified its revenue forecast of fiscal 4Q19 to the range of US$245 million to 252 million from prior US$263 million to 271 million as the U.S. government put Huawei on a trade blacklist. Cree said the update of financial guidance is in response to the decision on May 15, 2019, by the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) of the U.S. Department of Commerce to add Huawei Technologies and 68 of its affiliates to the “Entity List” maintained by the U.S...

In the manufacturing process of Micro LED display, inspection and repair technologies are indispensable to enhance and assure production yield. But again, given the massive amount of Micro LED chips in tiny size, Micro LED display makers face a great challenge for the testing and repairing process. LED testing includes photoluminescence (PL) and electroluminescence (EL) test, the former method can test LED chips without touching and ruining them but it might not detect all the defects compared to EL test. On the contrary, EL test is able to identify more defec...

Rumors about Apple said that the company will launch Mini LED products in the second half of 2019. Nevertheless, at Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference 2019, Mini LED products have not showed up. Instead, Apple presented a 32-inch HDR display, Pro Display XDR which adopts direct LED backlight. (Image: Apple) Pro Display XDR is a 32-inch 6K LCD monitor featuring a resolution of 6,016*3,384, 1,600 nits peak and 1,000 nits sustained brightness and a contract rate of 1,000,000:1. These characteristics were achieved by using a direct ...