South Korean LED manufacturing Giant Seoul Semiconductor and Japan-based Toshiba Materials held a press conference introducing SunLike, a new LED technology supported by Toshiba’s TRI-R phosphor solution, in Frankfurt, Germany. The SunLike LEDs with TRI-R phosphor technology simulate sun in terms of emission spectrum, eliminating excessive blue light and appearing to be more friendly to human eyes and circadian rhythm.

(Image: Seoul Semiconductor)

Seoul Semiconductor and Toshiba Materials co-developed the SunLike solution to optimize the spectral power distribution and the color rendering of LEDs by, with the addition of TRI-R phosphors invented by Toshiba Materials, replacing blue LEDs with purple emitters. The new technology effectively eliminates the blue energy peak–a major problem of LED that has been criticized for long–and is said to deliver a spectral power distribution (SPD) more similar to sunlight than that of conventional LEDs.

Kumpei Kobayashi, CEO of Toshiba Materials, expressed the company’s honor to collaborate with Seoul Semiconductor to contribute a friendly lighting environment launching the SunLike solution.

Lee Chung Hun, CEO of Seoul Semiconductor, also said the company was delighted to introduce this innovative LED technology after its WICOP family LEDs that brought a revolution of package technology in the industry. He added the SunLike LEDs will be used in lighting application sectors such as retail, museum, hospitality, and healthcare. He further explained the SunLike solution would afterwards march into horticultural lighting with the range of wavelengths akin to daylight that plants need for photosynthesis.

In fact, a bit more than two weeks ago at GILE 2017, Seoul Semiconductor had already showcased this new LED technology at its booth, theming ‘Close to the Sunlight Spectrum.’ By showing its products next to another incumbent light source, Seoul Semiconductor displayed the superior color rendering property of its products and indicated the solution did not carry blue light, hence with minimum light scattering and a better fit for human-centric lighting.

Seoul Semiconductor showcased its solution with the TRI-R technology at GILE 2017 in early June. (Image: LEDinside)

Essentially different from traditional phosphor-converted white LEDs, the SunLike solution sports, instead of blue LEDs, purple emitting chips as the base which is then covered by blue, green, and red TRI-R Phosphors developed by Toshiba Materials to create white light that approximates sunlight, compared to the regular method of using yellow phosphors on blue LEDs. Naturally, the SunLike LEDs do not deliver excessive blue light that causes sleep disorder and disrupts human circadian rhythms.

Seoul Semiconductor’s Lee anticipated this new LED solution to generate a whopping USD 4 billion revenue of the world lighting market in the following years. In addition, the company will first provide chip-on-board (CoB) SunLike packages as this specific package type is widely used in directional lighting for commercial sector; in other words, it is possibly the fastest way for this technology to penetrate the market.