As the 5G telecommunication booms, lighting products is expected to integrate with more intelligent control. The luminaires are no longer just lighting tools. Intelligent lighting is the market trend no matter in wired or wireless control. The ultimate goal is to integrate all lighting fixtures and home devices into the same network and control these devices through the APP. Users can easily control the lights, achieving energy, and asset management. MEAN WELL released LCM-40/60BLE series, LED drivers with CASAMBI Bluetooth mesh module, in 2019. This yea...

Charles Lee, CEO of PlayNitride, said in a recent interview that the company has secured several strategic investors that are willing to fund the expansion of the company’s production capacity. Hence, mass production of Micro LED solutions is not a slogan, but an imminent reality. Li further stated that the company’s annual revenue will eventually hit the 100 million mark in US dollars. Presently, the main bottleneck in the development of Micro LED is the low yield rate of the mass transfer process. Although manufacturers in the LED and display industri...

After Philips and GE, Cree has also announced its permanent parting with LED and the lighting industry. Cree announced on October 20th that the company has reached a final agreement with SMART Global Holdings, Inc., and plans to sell its LED department (Cree LED) to SMART for US$300 million, which includes an advance of US$50 million, a deferred payment of US$125 million, and an earn-out of US$125 million. Cree commented that this transaction has further established the company’s strategic position by leading the industrial transformation...

Upon closing, creates a pure-play global semiconductor powerhouse focused on providing disruptive technology solutions to high-growth segments including EV, 5G and industrial applications Transaction represents a key milestone in Cree’s transformation to focus on silicon carbide and gallium nitride devices, as well as materials Consideration includes $50 million upfront payment; $125 million seller note and up to $125 million earn-out DURHAM, N.C. – Cree, Inc. (Nasdaq: CREE) today announced that the Company has entered into a definitive agree...

Taiwanese automotive LED module manufacturer Laster Tech announced its September 2020 operating results. Due to the strong shipment of automotive LED modules, its September revenue was NTD 454 million, up 24.19% MoM and 50.84% YoY. The consolidated revenue in 3Q20 was NTD 1.246 billion, up 25.34% YoY, a record high quarterly revenue for the same period in history. According to Laster Tech, the company's September revenue grew month-on-month and year-on-year despite the appreciation of the NTD exchange rate, benefiting from the increased demand from majo...

Seoul Semiconductor Co., Ltd. (“Seoul”) (KOSDAQ 046890), a leading global innovator of LED products and technology, announced the introduction of its next-generation WICOP UHL (Ultra High Luminance) Series LEDs, which reduce headlamp power consumption up to 20% for electric vehicles, with an improvement of heat dissipation performance up to 40%. The company will begin mass production in 2021 and with promotions to key customers. Battery power consumption is one of the important requirements that determine the range of an electric vehicle, or ...

Concluding on October 13, Guangzhou International Lighting Exhibition reached a milestone of 25 years as a leading industry platform. From 96 exhibitors at its debut in 1996, to a total of 2,028 at this year’s edition, the growth and achievements of the past quarter of a century are to be celebrated. Once again, the fair was held concurrently with Guangzhou Electrical Building Technology (GEBT) and together, the two fairs attracted over 140,000 visitors to the heart of China’s manufacturing hub. As industry professionals gathered to showcase the latest lighting ...

A research team at Nagoya University in Japan has revealed that narrow-range UV irradiation using LED safely increases serum vitamin D levels in aging mice and thereby prevents the loss of their bone and muscle mass. The findings were recently published in the journal Scientific Reports, titled "Low energy irradiation of narrow-range UV-LED prevents osteosarcopenia associated with vitamin D deficiency in senescence-accelerated mouse prone 6.” Decreased bone density (osteoporosis) and the loss of muscle mass and strength (sarcopenia) are age-related disorder...

Signify reported that its horticulture LED lighting product was selected by GoodLeaf Community Farms in Canada to enhance food production. GoodLeaf grows and packs fresh greens year-round, operating a 4,000-square-metre indoor vertical farm in Ontario, Canada, which is now fully operational to supply some of the largest Canadian retail chains. The vertical farm is fully automated and equipped with the latest LED lighting technology for growing indoors. By providing a controlled environment, Philips Greenpower LED production modules enable GoodLeaf to shorten prod...

Chinese TV brands have been proactively launching Mini LED backlit TVs. After TCL and Xiaomi releasing their new products, Konka also announced that it will debut a 75-inch 8K TV featuring Mini LED backlight technology. Konka said that this 75-inch 8K TV adopts Mini LED backlight technology with more than 20,000 units of Mini LED chips to realize 5184 local dimming zones. Implementing IPS RGB display, the TV achieves 8K resolution and support 120Hz and 60Hz refresh rate. (Image: Konka) Cost of Mini LED Backlit TVs Remain High...

LiDAR sensor manufacturers across the world including Innoviz Technologies, Hesai, Lumentum and Velodyne Lidar have announced their new achievements recently and are going to showcase novel technologies at upcoming events. Innoviz Technologies added a new sensor to its product line, the InnovizTwo. The new automotive-grade LiDAR sensor, with a major cost reduction design of over 70% compared to InnovizOne, offers a solution for all levels of autonomous driving. Samples of InnovizTwo will be available in Q3 2021. (Image: Innoviz) China-based Hesai also re...

LED companies including Nichia, Osram and Lumileds updated the results of their patent disputes against Lighting Science Group (LSG) yesterday on October 14. All the three companies prevailed over the LSG’s asserted LED patents. (Image: Pixabay) LSG has initiated patent infringement lawsuit against Nichia, Osram and Lumileds claiming that the three LED manufacturers violet its patents covering LSG’s United States Patent Nos. 7,528,421; 7,095,053; and 7,098,483, in 2019. On April 7, 2020, and October 1, 2020, the United States I...

Light Rider announced its first two quantum encryption products poised to revolutionize network security for businesses and individuals. The company combines LiFi and quantum encryption technology for individual users. By marrying the two groundbreaking technologies, Light Rider is setting the stage for a new type of wireless networking with unparalleled security, improved speed and reduced latency. (Image: Light Rider) Light Rider recently filed patents for its innovative technology and its first two products will be available for purchase later this year. Light Rider L...

A study led by researchers at the Brown University School of Public Health found that using tuned LED lighting cut in half the number of sleep disturbances among older residents in long-term care. By installing interior lighting fixtures that change color and intensity over the course of the day and night, sleep disturbances experienced by residents in one California nursing home were improved without involving prescribing sleeping pills. (Image: Brown University) Rosa Baier, an associate professor at the Brown University, led a team of seven researchers who studie...

Velodyne Lidar recently reported new collaboration with its partners in China. The recently listed LiDAR maker said that it has entered a long‑term global cross-licensing relationship with RoboSense (Suteng Innovation Technology) and signed a three-year sales agreement with Baidu. (Image: Velodyne Lidar) The cross-licensing relationship with RoboSense encompasses a broad range of 360° surround-view LiDAR sensors, by which Velodyne said will be mutually beneficial for the existing and future patents of both companies. Velodyne and RoboSense have also agr...

Acuity Brands reported that it has entered into strategic agreements with Violet Defense and Puro Lighting. These strategic agreements will give Acuity Brands access to Violet Defense’s patented UV technology to expand its portfolio of UV disinfection products. PURO and Acuity Brands will also work together on the development of a next generation of UV lighting products. (Image: Pixabay) The products from Violet Defense and PURO employ a method pioneered by Violet Defense to deliver high intensity full spectrum ultraviolet light, using a pulsed x...

From fire to electricity, the human civilization continues to unfold through advances in science and technology. All of this progress has been built on the acquisition and harnessing of different forms of energies. Likewise, the great technological innovations of the recent century or so are made possible by evolutionary changes in the delivery of electricity to end-users. Since the rivalry between Thomas Edison and Nikola Tesla more than a hundred years ago, DC and AC have been competing for supremacy in an ever-expanding range of power applications. The course of the rivalry i...

Since LED technology became mature enough for lighting applications, it has soon entered a plateau period and attracted players across the globe. The industry then turned into a battlefield with low price products and flat profit. Several leading lighting companies including GE, Osram, Cree and others, enlarged their focus into other special lighting applications. Horticulture lighting is one of their targets. (Image: Osram) Adding artificial light sources to help crops to grow has a long history in horticulture but the use of LEDs for such applications offers complete...

Axus Technology, a provider of CMP, wafer thinning and wafer polishing surface-processing solutions for semiconductor applications, announced the collaboration with Compound Photonics (CP, also known as CP Display), a microdisplay solutions developer for AR/MR. The two parties will work to accelerate sub 5 µm pixel Micro LED development to the mass market. (Image: Compound Photonics) Axus and CP are partnering to integrate critical wafer-scale processes needed for mass-production scale up of CP’s 2 µm pixel, 1080p Micro LED displays fo...

JBD reported that it will release its JBD4UM480P Micro LED display series extending the AmµLED™ family in November this year. This series has a display area of 0.13-inch (3.3 mm) in diagonal and a resolution of 640X480. Approaching the size of a grain of rice (Figure 1), the display panel can be easily designed into a smart glass due to its ultra-compact footprint. The panels deliver luminance of 0.2 million nits, 2 million nits, and 0.15 million nits for red, green, and blue, respectively for a power consumption of only a few hundred mW under average oper...

Lextar and X Display Company (XDC) announced that they have entered into agreements, including Development and License Agreement and Services Agreement wherein Lextar has licensed XDC’s Intellectual Property, and both Lextar’s and XDC’s customers will be supplied Lextar’s high-performance MicroLEDs. “We are pleased to announce our partnership with XDC, which brings the innovative and feasible Micro LED display mass-production technology to Lextar, “said Mr. C.N. Huang, Vice President of Lextar Technology Ce...

Company closes first of 3 tranches in Series D round. Backing will be used to complete product development near Grenoble and create a new display manufacturing facility based on Aledia’s proprietary technology of 3D microLEDs. Aledia, a French startup that is pioneering a disruptive technology for microLED displays, has closed an €80M first tranche of its €120M D-round financing. The company will use the proceeds to complete its product development and create the first-of-its-kind, high-volume 3D microLED manufacturing facility in the Grenoble are...

In this release, TrendForce provides its forecast of 10 key trends in the tech industry for 2021. As the DRAM industry officially enters the EUV era, NAND Flash stacking technology advances past 150L The three major DRAM suppliers Samsung, SK Hynix, and Micron will not only continue their transition towards the 1Znm and 1alpha nm process technologies, but also formally introduce the EUV era, with Samsung leading the charge, in 2021. DRAM suppliers will gradually replace their existing double patterning technologies in order to optimize their cost str...

Velodyne Lidar announced on September 29 that it has completed the business combination with Graf Industrial. The LiDAR producer reported in July this year that it will go public through the combination. The two companies have closed the combination and Velodyne has became a wholly owned subsidiary of Graf which changed its name to Velodyne Lidar. Beginning on Wednesday, September 30, 2020, the common stock and warrants of Velodyne Lidar, Inc., the post-combination company, is being listed and to begin trading on The Nasdaq Global Select Market under the ticke...

Designers of automotive systems can now add dynamic hand-gesture controls with sensors combining IR array. Maxim Integrated released a new product, MAX25205, which integrates optics and a 6x10 infrared (IR) sensor to detect swipe and hand-rotation gestures without cameras. Based on the technology, the sensor can be smaller in size and cost only one tenth comparing to other camera-based product. (Image: Maxim Integrated) Automakers predict driver safety will improve when gesture and proximity sensing replace knobs and touch screens for infotainment, phone, side mirror, cl...

New research published in EPJ B reveals that the higher-than-expected efficiency of PLEDs can be reached through interactions between triplet excitons, and impurities embedded in their polymer layers. (Image: EPJ B) Polymer LEDs (PLEDs) are devices containing single layers of luminescent polymers, sandwiched between two metal electrodes. They produce light as the metal layers inject electrons and holes into the polymer, creating distortions which can combine to form two different types of electron-hole pair: either light-emitting ‘singlets,’ or a non-...

Following its announcement last week, Xiaomi launched two 82-inch TVs with Mini LED backlight technology featuring 8K and 4K resolution. The 8K one priced RMB 49999 and the 4K is RMB 9999. Both product will be released on October 21, 2020. (Image: Xiaomi) LEDinside learned that Xiaomi’s Mini LED TVs adopt the backlight solution based on a sprinkle of Mini LED components sized 1616. The 8K TV used 15,360 units of Mini LEDs to achieve 960 local dimming zones. Each of the dimming zone can deliver 4096 grayscales to realize a high contrac...

Sharp is going to spin off its display business, setting up a new subsidiary named “Sharp Display Technology” (SDTC) on October 1, 2020, reported The Sankei News. The new spinoff will focus on novel display technology particularly Micro LED. (Image: LEDinside) By establishing SDTC, Sharp plan to collect more external funds for Micro LED development, which will support the company to join the competition of next-gen display technology that currently ruled by Sony, Samsung and other competitors. It was revealed in August that Sharp has buil...

Crystal IS, an Asahi Kasei company, and Boston University’s National Emerging Infectious Disease Laboratories (NEIDL) have performed research demonstrating the efficacy of Crystal IS’ Klaran UVC LEDs to inactivate SARS-CoV-2. Crystal IS initiated this research to understand how SARS-CoV-2, the virus which causes COVID-19, responds to ultraviolet light across the emission range of Klaran UVC LEDs (260 nm to 270 nm) and at different doses. (Image: Crystal IS) Log Reduction as a Function of Dose and LED Peak ...

Yearly Mini LED backlight TV shipment is projected to reach 4.4 million units for 2021, a 2% penetration rate in the overall TV market, as brands begin integrating Mini LED backlights into their TVs and continue to improve technologies as well as optimize costs, according to TrendForce’s latest investigations. While Apple is set to release IT products featuring Mini LED backlights, Korea-based Samsung and LG will both debut their own Mini LED backlight TVs in 2021. In particular, as part of its effort to deploy Mini LED backlight across its produ...