The U.S. Supreme Court today upheld the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s (FERC) authority to design rules and incentives that allow electricity customers to get paid for reducing consumption during periods of high energy demand. The decision keeps the door open for important clean energy resources to compete with traditional fossil plants in regional energy markets and save customers money on their electricity bills.

The U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science has awarded six Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR)-Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) grants to proposals targeting advances in solid-state lighting (SSL) technology. The six Phase I Release 1 grants will explore the technical merit and commercial potential of different innovative concepts or technologies that are expected to contribute to the achievement of the price and performance goals described in DOE’s SSL R&D Plan. 

Philips decision to sell Lumileds to Chinese financial group Go Scale Capital has taken a sharp turn. The business deal was abruptly halted by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), due to unknown concerns. Philips and Go Scale Capital has been forced to call off the deal, which has sent shockwaves throughout the market and caused new changes in manufacturers’ competition race.

Toshiba is considering to sell its less profitable semiconductor businesses including its System LSI business to concentrate resources in advanced NAND, flash memory, and nuclear power generators and other coal fire equipment, according to a recent Nikkei report.

Chinese mobile phone manufacturer TECHNO has launched a project called “Light up Ikeja”, and donated solar-powered streetlights to the local community in the West African state.

Last week Samsung denied plans of implementing unpaid leave for its LED business sector, and in an act to seemingly to quell negative rumors regarding its LED business, the company unveiled its latest mid-power LED package LM561B+ for high quality color performance last Thursday.

GO Scale Capital and Royal Philips announced that the parties have terminated their March 2015 agreement for GO Scale Capital to acquire 80.1% of Royal Philips' LED lighting components and automotive lighting business, Lumileds. After close to one year of best efforts by GO Scale Capital and Royal Philips to obtain approval from the Committee on Foreign Investment in United States (CFIUS), the parties have been unable to resolve CFIUS' unspecified concerns.         

LED bulb procurement prices in Madhya Pradesh, located in central India, have dropped another 10% from INR 73 per bulb (US $1.08) to INR 64.41 per unit, according to an official statement on Sunday.

Japanese OLED panel manufacturer Japan Display announced it will be mass producing OLED panels in 2018, which has led many tech media including Engadget and Apple Rumors to speculate Apple might be launching an OLED screened phone in the near future.

Seoul Semiconductor a global leading LED components manufacturer from Korea, and the Austrian company LUMITECH, a leading manufacturer of components for Human Centric Lighting announced a licensing agreement for PI-LED technology patents. These patents govern the industrial trade mark rights of LUMITECH’s PI-LED technology, which can implement tunable white from 2.500 to 7.000K with perfect colour rendering in a high and constant efficiency. Based on the license agreement, Seoul Semiconductor has the right to offer tunable white components based on the leading PI-LED technology, worldwide.

This has been a turbulent week for the LED industry. Philips announced just a few hours ago that it has terminated the sales of Lumileds to Go Scale Capital, the company was forced to abort the US $3.3 billion business transaction, due to opposition raised by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS). The company probably has a potential buyer lined up, and it will be worth observing who the new owner of Lumileds will be.

Royal Philips announced that Philips and GO Scale Capital have terminated the agreement pursuant to which the consortium led by GO Scale Capital would acquire an 80.1% interest in Lumileds.

*General Lighting market is projected to have annual 9.5% growth until 2020, while automotive lighting is to grow at 4% per year.   German lighting manufacturer Osram is confident that its large investors will support its new strategy of investing in general LED lighting market, reported Reuters.

A research team from Sheffield University has recently published there latest findings of growing LEDs on semi-polar GaN or sapphire on Applied Physics Letter recently.

When the LED industry speaks about emerging markets, India, Russia, and Middle East countries are probably the top three markets that pop up in manufacturers’ minds. Rarely, do people think about testing the waters in the African market, but one Hong Kong LED lighting manufacturer has made its way into Nigeria.

The Bangalore Electricity Supply Company (Bescom) in India was not aware of union Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL) LED bulb policy, according to a report from Bangalore Mirror.

Option announces the acquisition of the shares of the Dutch LED lighting companies Lemnis Lighting BV Public and Innolumis Public Lighting BV and merges the two companies into a single commercial organization under the name Innolumis Public Lighting.

At an analyst day, Osram unveiled further details of its three-pillar strategy presented in November last year and of the innovation and growth initiative. In all its three pillars, the lighting company wants to benefit even more from the potential of semiconductor-based technologies and will make appropriate investments in the coming years. In the Specialty Lighting (SP) business, Osram is increasing the focus of its automotive business on LED-based products and the system business as well as investments in new technologies such as laser and OLED. In the Lighting Solutions & Systems (LSS) segment, Osram will expand its product portfolio for Smart Cities and Smart Buildings applications in the years to come, thus taking account of rising urbanization. In the LED components business (Opto Semiconductors, OS), Osram aims to become the cost leader thanks to its lead in technology, economies of scale, and factor cost benefits from the planned 6-inch LED chip plant in Kulim, Malaysia. The plant will be the largest of its kind. “We are well on our way to becoming a high-tech company. With our innovation and growth initiative we are shifting the focus to sustainable growth,” said Olaf Berlien, Chief Executive Officer of OSRAM Licht AG.

ANADIGICS announced that, on January 15, 2016, it entered into a definitive agreement and plan of merger pursuant to which II-VI Incorporated ("II-VI") has offered to acquire all of the outstanding shares of ANADIGICS common stock on a fully diluted basis for $0.66 per share net in cash, pursuant to an all-cash tender offer and second-step merger (the "II-VI Merger Agreement").  The offer price in the II-VI Merger Agreement constitutes an increase of $0.31 per share over the November 11, 2015 agreement and plan of merger pursuant to which affiliates of GaAs Labs, LLC offered to acquire all of the outstanding shares of ANADIGICS common stock on a fully diluted basis for $0.35 per share net in cash, pursuant to an all-cash tender offer and second-step merger (the "GaAs Labs Merger Agreement").  On January 12, 2016, the Company announced that the $0.66 per-share offer from II-VI (an "Excluded Party," as defined in the GaAs Labs Merger Agreement, and referred to in the Company's January 12, 2016 announcement as "Party A") had been determined by the Company's Board of Directors to constitute a "Superior Offer," as that term is defined in the GaAs Labs Merger Agreement.

Taiwanese LED manufacturer Unity Opto Technology and Sercomm Corporation, a manufacturer of broadband and wireless networking equipment forged a partnership for smart lighting R&D. After Toshiba authorized Unity Opto as its distributor in Europe, the company expected to expand market presence in Europe in the future, projecting approximately 30% revenue growth in 2016.

Leading U.S. LED company Cree will be setting back the spinout of its radio frequency and power product businesses, the company CEO Chuck Swoboda told analysts Tuesday.

Cree, a market leader in LED lighting, today announced revenue of US $436 million for its second quarter of fiscal 2016, ended December 27, 2015. This represents a 5% increase compared to revenue of $413 million reported for the second quarter of fiscal 2015, and a 2% increase compared to the first quarter of fiscal 2016. GAAP net income for the second quarter of fiscal 2016 was $14 million, or $0.14 per diluted share, compared to GAAP net income of $12 million, or $0.10 per diluted share, for the second quarter of fiscal 2015. On a non-GAAP basis, net income for the second quarter of fiscal 2016 was $30 million, or $0.30 per diluted share, compared to non-GAAP net income for the second quarter of fiscal 2015 of $38 million, or $0.33 per diluted share.

In an effort to study the effects of lighting on human health and diseases, the Smart Lighting Engineering Research Center (ERC) atRensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI), recently installed a novel hospital inpatient lighting testbed for the study of automated lighting at theUniversity of New Mexico Health Center (UNMHC) in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The testbed is a demonstration of the success of the multi-institutional, interdisciplinary Engineering Research Center Program funded by the National Science Foundation.  

One of the most triumphant moments in the book and recent movie The Martian comes when lead character, Mark Watney, successfully grows a potato crop on Mars. It’s more than food for survival; he’s also nourishing his spirit.  In space, there is no scent of baking bread, no wind on your face, no sound of raindrops hitting the roof, no favorite kitten to curl up in your lap. Over time, being deprived of these common earthbound sense stimulations takes a toll. Having limited access to stimuli to the senses is identified as a significant risk by NASA’sBehavioral Health and Performance team.

Olaf Berlien, CEO of OSRAM Licht AG, and Grant Wright, CEO and CFO of OSRAM Americas, unveiled the new OSRAM Americas headquarters at a ribbon cutting ceremony recently in Wilmington, Massachusetts.

Shortly after Epistar held its board meeting on Monday, numerous reports from Taiwanese media claimed the company was about to be merged. MLS, Philips and even Lumileds were named by speculators as potential buyers, following the reports Epistar’s shares climbed up to NT $29.5 (US $0.88) per share, reported TechNews. However, Epistar Spokesman Rider Chang has denied all these claims.

A sharp eyed Twitter user has spotted a code implying Li-Fi functions might be incorporated in later generation Apple iOS, reportedTechRadar and other media.

The Indian government has rolled out numerous large scaled LED bulb distribution projections across the nation, but not all Indian consumers are warming up to the low-priced bulbs, according to a report from The Deccan Herald.

The collaboration, which is partly funded by Innovate UK under the £14m Energy Catalyst Programme, follows on from work by Anvil Semiconductors and the Cambridge Centre for GaN at the University of Cambridge where they successfully grew cubic GaN on 3C-SiC on silicon wafers by MOCVD. The underlying 3C-SiC layers were produced by Anvil using its patented stress relief IP that enables growth of device quality silicon carbide on 100mm diameter silicon wafers.  

A representative from Samsung Electric has recently rebutted Korean media Edaily report recent claims it has rolled out unpaid vacation schemes for employees working in its LED business department.