Many LED manufacturers have been pushing their development in Mini LED, hoping to target niche markets with high-margin products as the oversupply and price competition in the industry have continued. Taiwan-based LED chip producer Epistar is an active player in developing Mini LED technology and has restructured its organization to strengthen its Mini LED business.

Automotive LED light supplier Excellence Optoelectronics Inc (EOI) has reported its continuous yearly growth in the past three quarters of 2018 and announced that it plans to develop Mini LED and Micro LED displays for automotive applications and larger size displays. (Image: EOI) EOI has supplied its Flexible Uniflex rear lamp module and LED light sources for the center high-mounted stop lamp (CHMSL) for Tesla Model 3. Currently it ships 5000-6000 units per week for Tesla Model 3 and the company is looking forward to increasing the shipment. Si...

The Chinese government has launched new policies to reduce the impacts of the U.S. tariffs on Chinese exporters. One of them is to raise duty drawback rates for the exported products. The policy will become effective on November 1st, 2018.

Chinese LED driver manufacturer Inventronics has announced its plan to set up a subsidiary in Mexico with Osmanthus Holding Limited to expand its operations in the market of America and meet the requirements of local production for its clients.

DRAM supplier Apacer is going showcase its lighting inspection solutions targeting horticulture and agricultural lighting at Hong Kong International Lighting Fair (Autumn Edition) from October 27th to 30th, 2018.

Signify has reported its results for the third quarter of 2018. The sales for 3Q18 came to EUR 1.6 billion (US$ 1.82 billion), with an on-year drop of 5.3 percent. The sales of LED-based products represented 70% of total sales and grew by 0.1% compared to 3Q17. Its net income was EUR 93 million (US$ 105.85 million), which dropped by 15.1% YoY.

In response to Nichia’s announcement of the final result of the patent lawsuit in Germany, Everlight reported that Nichia’s patent in Europe has expired in 2017 and that the result does not affect Everlight’s current products.

Chinese LED package company Kinglight has launched new facilities in Suzhou, China which will be producing Mini LED and fine-pitch LED products.

The applications of IoT have been under the spotlight in many parts of the industry. Osram, as a high-tech company, has presented eight approaches in healthcare where IoT can be applied to solve problems.

Cree has announced the results of its annual shareholders meeting including the appointment of a new chairman and two newly elected members to the board of directors.

Taiwanese panel producer Innolux has announced the restructuring of the company’s organization. Robert Shiao, the prior president of the company, has become Vice Chairman. James Yang was promoted as President from Vice President and will oversee the business unit, operation unit and manufacturer unit of Innolux. According to Jim Hung, Chairman of Innolux, the new management team would strengthen the flexibility and competitiveness of the company.

Samsung Electronics has worked closely with the filming and entertainment industry to promote its Onyx LED Cinema. The company has announced a new CSI Leasing program to service its existing and future customers as well as sharing the list of certified resellers for the Samsung Onyx at this year’s ShowEast event.

LEDinside forecasts that the development of Mini LED will accelerate in 2019 and 2020 and its market value will reach US$ 1699 million by 2022. Several industry players including San’an, HC Semitek, Epistar, NationStar, Harvatek, and Macroblock have reported their progress of Mini LED development. Meanwhile, panel producers such as AUO, BOE, Innolux and JDI have also unveiled applications adopting Mini LED technology.

The patent lawsuit between Japanese LED producer Nichia and Taiwanese LED manufacturer Everlight in Germany has finalized on October 1, 2018.

What is road driving going to be like in the future? Volkswagen has displayed its new vehicle lighting systems to show automotive LED lightings which project information onto the road and provide communication functions between cars to further improve road safety.

LED driver IC company Macroblock has registered the highest monthly revenue of 2018 for September, which came to NT$ 305 million with an increase of 14.22% MoM and 16.14 YoY.

Mini LED is one of the key technologies for 2019 and will be making its way into the displays of consumer electronics. On the other hand, Micro LED technology, which has been on the spotlight in the recent years, is expected to be applied on displays in the market by 2021, according to the forecast of LEDinside.

AB Fagerhult, the largest lighting company in the Nordic countries has signed a Letter of Intent (LOI) with the shareholders of iGuzzini, an Italian lighting group, to acquire 100 percent of the shares of iGuzzini.

Japan-based electronics company Panasonic has announced that the company will quit production of mercury lamps by the end of June 2020 and promote LED lighting replacement in response to the Minamata Convention on Mercury.

Professional UV and IR LED manufacturer High Power Lighting (HPL) has partnered with Epileds to establish a joint venture, Bioraytron. Bioraytron is a DUV LED manufacture company specializing in vertically integration of DUV LED from the production of epitaxy and wafer to packaging. Bioraytron will participate in BioOpto Japan 2018. The 10th BioOpto Japan will be held from October 17th to 19th 2018 in Chiba, Japan.

Alabama Power has established an innovation project to grow food in a shipping container retrofitted with LED lighting provided by Freight Farm. The aim of the project is to find out if the cost of using electricity to power indoor agriculture is more efficient and feasible in comparison with traditional agriculture.

Nichia reported a new update of its patent lawsuit with Everlight, the Taiwanese package company. 

A European Apple patent application related to the technology of Micro LED display was published, reported Patently Apple.

Taiwanese LED companies have registered their revenue for September and most of them posted an on-year decrease. 

Mitsubishi Electric Corporation has reported its testing of a new system equipped with wind LIDAR (light detection and ranging) and water vapor DIAL (differential absorption LIDAR). The testing is aimed at developing measuring methods to forecast torrential rain.

Chinese panel maker BOE has attempted to supply its OLED panels to Samsung Electronics, according to Korean media, The Investor. The report said BOE has been working on samples for the panels used in Samsung’s Galaxy Watch.

The U.S.-based LED technology developer, Neo Lights Holdings, has aimed to set up its manufacturing facilities in India and announced that the company is in discussion with several Indian producers to determine the optimized approaches of collaboration. 

With the orders of backlight products and fine pitch displays, Epistar has reached the highest monthly revenue of NT$ 1.93 billion (US$ 62.38 million) of the year in September with an increase of 1.36% MoM and a decrease of 22% YoY. 

The development of LED applications in horticulture has continued to transform our understanding of farming. Delphy, a Dutch company, has recently conducted research on growing raspberries and blackberries with LED lighting, aiming to harvest them during winter.

Lextar has reported revenue drop in September due to its continuous product adjustments. The company registered a revenue of NT$ 98 million (US$ 3.17 million) for September with a decrease of 6.7% YoY.