Penetration rates for flash LED in smartphone applications has already reached 100 percent. Ample business opportunities are attracting many within the industry. Main f lash LED driver specs have been 1000mA, 500mA, and 350mA in 2013. Industry insiders believe that LED development in 2014 will take on a M shape, with 1000mA leading the pack for high= voltage flash LED drivers and 350mA on top for low-current flash LED drivers.

The story behind LED development—only the 4th lighting technology developed in human history—is remarkable. The potential ahead of LED lighting to deliver real and measurable advantages—to save energy, last years longer, significantly lower bottom-line costs—is limitless.  But for it to be the next great defining feature of the lighting landscape, LED lighting needs to work.

With ‘modest progress’ and a ‘growing sense of realism’ being widely reported to sum up the mood at this year’s climate change talks, Philips is calling for renewed optimism and action. This is based on the energy savings impact the company is seeing from the implementation of energy efficient lighting technologies such as LED.

Rubicon Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:RBCN), a leading provider of sapphire substrates and products to the LED, semiconductor, and optical markets, today announced that Warren S. Stewart III has joined the Company as Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing, effective immediately. Mr. Stewart was formerly Vice President, Sales, at Cree, Inc., in Durham, North Carolina. He will provide leadership to Rubicon’s global sales and marketing team, reporting to Raja M. Parvez, President and Chief Executive Officer.

Soraa, the world leader in the development of gallium nitride on gallium nitride (GaN on GaN™) LED technology, announced today that it will open a new semiconductor fabrication plant in Buffalo, New York. In partnership with the State of New York, the company will construct a new state-of-the-art GaN on GaN™ LED fabrication facility that will employ hundreds of workers. The new facility is projected to be operational in 2015. Soraa currently operates an LED fabrication plant in Fremont, California, one of only a few in the U.S.

The proposal is based on patent pending intelligent ParallelView™ LED lighting products MagicLight™ and MagicSign™, which are supported by patent pending Plug-n-Power™ AC-DC Power Distribution Systems, resulting in the most comprehensive, energy efficient and environmentally friendly general lighting solutions in the World.

Specializing in the LED automotive lighting niche market and LED commercial lighting market, Laster Tech has benefitted from the continued growth of the Chinese automotive market. With more and more automobiles utilizing LED lights, the LED automotive lighting industry has seen continued growth in 2013. Consolidated revenue for Jan.-Oct. reached NT $1.34 billion (US $43 million), a yearly growth of 34.31 percent.

The release of low priced LED bulbs by Cree acted as a catalyst this year. One by one international companies are speeding up their LED lighting market strategy. GE Lighting Solutions (GE) hosted their 2014 new product conference on November 19th 2013, with lighting partners Lextar, Chicony, and LiteOn. GE announced the return of the LED Omni A19 to the Taiwanese market and showcased a multitude of new products.

NVC Lighting (NVC) received a visit from UK Birmingham Councilor Sir Albert Bore on November 15th to the company’s Lighting Experience Center in Chongqing where both sides entered into an in-depth discussion regarding investment and development of the NVC Birmingham factory. CEO Wu Changjiang of NVC spoke in detail about the company’s management concept and overseas expansion plans. Among the industries in China encountered during Bore’s trip to China, he expressed that NVC is the only company to receive investments from the city. Both sides hope to cooperate in investment and development of NVC UK.

Korea research organization UBI Research compares archrival LG Electronics and Samsung 55-inch OLED TVs in its latest research report. Below is the research organization’s press release.

Dialog Semiconductor plc (FWB: DLG), a provider of highly integrated power management, AC/DC, solid state lighting and short-range wireless technologies, today announced a strategic collaboration with Sengled, a global leading provider of LED lighting solutions and Dialog’s first partner for the commercialization of Dialog’s smarteXiteTM platform. Based on fully configurable logic, smarteXite integrates the latest digital dimming standard – Ledotron™ – and enables a new generation of highly flexible and intelligent LED driver ICs for smart lighting applications.

The Albuquerque Convention Center, a multi-purpose event complex with more than 270,000 square feet of meeting and exhibit space, recently selected energy efficient LED lighting from Cree, Inc. (Nasdaq: CREE) to improve the facility and provide better illumination for visitors. Powered by Cree TrueWhite® Technology and Lutron® controls, the LED luminaires deliver superior light quality to the East Complex of the Convention Center, while reducing the Convention Center’s annual lighting energy usage from an industry standard 40 percent to just 7.6 percent of its total energy usage.

With increased demand for LED lighting this year, large global lighting manufacturers have been strategizing their next move in the LED lighting market. The Taiwan LED bulb market has emerged as a strategically important area. Following the release of color tunable LED bulbs by Liteon subsidiary Leotek, U.S. manufacturer GE announced on November 19th that the GE LED Omni A19 will return to the Taiwan market next month. The new generation LED Omni A19 not only has increased brightness, but also more competitively priced.

China Electric Manufacturing Corp. has announced its acquisition of GIO Optoelectronics Corp. in hopes to meet their operation goal of increasing LED lighting revenue share by 20 percent next year.

Revolution Lighting Technologies, Inc. announced it has acquired Tri-State LED in a cash and stock transaction. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

When it launches the new Osram Ostar Medical, Osram Opto Semiconductors will be introducing the first LED component with a high color-rendering index (CRI) of 95 and the possibility of adjusting the temperature of the color white. This makes it ideal for medical applications – for instance in operating rooms, where a precisely controlled chromaticity coordinate and high natural color rendering are crucial.

Intematix Corp., a leading innovator of patented phosphor solutions for high-quality LED lighting, today announced the volume shipments of their remote phosphor component that enables 150W equivalent LED retrofit lamps. This production release adds to the product family already enabling 40W, 60W, 75W and 100W bulb replacements all using a similar omnidirectional form factor.

Toshiba Corporation (TOKYO:6502) today announced that it has launched “TLP2391”, a high-speed photocoupler for servo motors and programmable logic controllers (PLCs) which works with both plus and minus LED currents. Mass production is scheduled to start in December.

U.S. manufacturer Veeco and German company Aixtron that have long possessed China’s LED epitaxal wafer MOCVD market, will be facing “war declarations” issued by Chinese manufacturers, according to a report by Chinese newspaper The National Business Daily. 

China’s National Development and Reform Commission and others announced the country’s latest strategic new industry development report at the China Hi-tech Fair on Nov. 16, 2013. Most industries remain small in Guangdong Province’s eight strategic new industries, according to the province’s latest strategic new industry report.

Over the past few years, Japan has seen an upsurge in energy conservation awareness. In the wake of the Tohoku earthquake in 2011, the government has even proposed plans for a “low-carbon society”. LED products have since experienced rapid popularization becoming the poster child for energy saving products. A recent survey shows the Japanese LED market size will undergo explosive growth in 2012 of 195 percent to $420.4 billion Japanese yen (US $4.2 billion),as reported by Liberty Times.

Photonics Industry and Technology Development Association (PIDA) compiled a list of the top 10 global LED lighting manufactures, according to Economic Daily News, with international heavy weights Philips, Osram, and Panasonic among the top three. No Taiwanese manufacturers made the list. Taiwanese lighting brands currently include China Electric, Everlight, Delta, Tatung, Adata, Tsannkuen, and Leotek.

Taiwanese upstream LED chip manufacturers’ 3Q13 financial results showed gross profit margin improvements.

Philips and Desso - global leaders in lighting and carpets respectively - today announce a partnership agreement to develop solutions that combine LED lighting with light transmissive carpet. This innovation will further unlock the potential of LED integration into surfaces and adds an exciting dimension to interior design and space planning. The solution will transform the way people interact with information and their environment in offices, hotels, conference centers and other public buildings.

Wavien, Inc. announces the opening of a unique custom products service that can build targeted prototypes with various types and brands of LEDs, RLT recycling collars, lenses, and heat-sinks. Wavien, as a technology development and licensing company, establishes this service to provide a user-friendly process for potential licensees to evaluate the RLT technology, build initial products, test market, and eventually license Wavien's technology.

Large international brands including Nichia, Osram, and Toyoda Gosei have begun to work more closely together in exchanging authorized patents to increase market control, noted Fan Bing, technical director of the software and integrated circuit promotion center under China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT). Big brands patent partnership strategies aim to monopolize high-end technologies and markets, and to acquire higher profits before the semiconductor lighting market matures. 

Smartphones are driving up demands for flash LED. Aside from Philips Lumileds, Cree, Osram and other leading global manufacturers in the flash market, Taiwanese and Korean manufacturers are also entering the market. Samsung plans to switchits flash LED package specs from 4139 to 2016. Following various manufacturers  production launch, industry insiders estimate larger price cuts for flash LEDs in 1Q14.

Taiwan package manufacturer Harvatek reported a turnaround in 3Q13 after seven straight quarters of loss. Benefiting from an increase of 50 to60 percent in production capacity utilization rate in 3Q as well as investments of NT $22.39 million (US $758 thousand) in 3Q, revenue reached NT $1.24 billion, a quarterly growth of 9.86 percent.

Taiwanese LED packager Edison Opto’s  3Q13 financial results showed the company’s consolidated revenue reached NT$ 826 million (US$ 27.99 million) and underwent a Year-on-Year (YoY) growth rate of 44.89 percent and Quarter-on-Quarter (QoQ) of 1.6 percent. Under market cutthroat price competition in 2Q, consolidated profit margin was up 7.7 percent compared to 2Q13 to 19.97 percent.

The advancements made in chip architecture and phosphor technology are the key ingredients to the performance enhancement of the new high-power LED Z5-M1 series.The efficacy enhancements in the new Z5-M1 series not only ensure a reduction in luminaire development costs incurred by Seoul Semiconductor customers, but also enable the best possible color over angle homogeneity with the new phosphor coating technology