Apple was grated with several patents relating to smart fabric in the past week. One of them is a glove with integrated circuity and forces sensors that could connect to Apple device for monitoring blood pressure, respiration and heart rate, reported Patently Apple. (Image: The US Patent and Trademark Office) According to the patent, Apple embeds force sensing circuity into fabrics that could sense pressure and force on the fingers and/or palm area of the glove. The glove can transmit the information collected from the circuitry to other devices for further processing an...

Sweden-based Fagerhult announced on December 21 that it has signed an agreement to acquire iGuzzini, the Italian lighting group for EUR 385 million (US$ 439 million). According to Fagerhult, the price of EUR 385 million will be paid with 74 percent in cash and 26 percent in new Fagerhult shares. The transaction is expected to complete in the first quarter of 2019. With iGuzzini joining the Fagerhult Group will, the largest lighting company in the Nordic countries will increase its presence in Italy, Switzerland, Spain and North America. The combined compan...

Revolution Lighting Technologies announced that it will expand its rNET lighting controls system capabilities through the integration of the control sensors by SENSORWORX. The partnership with SENSORWORK is also in line with the company’s strategy of supporting Buy American Act (BAA) and Trade Agreement Act (TAA). Based in Connecticut, USA, SENSORWORK produces sensors and controls for lighting products for energy saving. Revolution Lighting said that the solutions of SENSORWORX allows rNET to further expand its ove...

Unilumin Group, a Chinese LED application supplier, has collaborated with Maverick AV Solutions for expanding the market penetration of LED fine pitch displays in Europe. Unilumin manufacturers LED products ranging from 0.9mm to 12mm pixel pitch. The company also operates in a variety of verticals including command and control rooms, broadcast studios, corporate atria, meeting spaces and digital signage. With the partnership with Maverick AV Solutions, Unilumin is going to increase its presence in the European market. The Maverick team will push the LED prod...

Italian automotive component company Magneti Marelli, announced that it will join CES 2019 to exhibit its high-tech offerings at CES 2019. Through the participation of the show, Magneti Marelli aims to address the needs of autonomous driving and connectivity with a wide range of smart, streamlined and highly integrated lighting and electronics solutions. The company offers automotive technologies to improve communication between vehicles, the occupants and the surrounding environment. According to the company, its third generation Smart Corner will be unveiled at CES...

TDC – Technical Direction Company, an Australia-based video solution equipment supplier, has offered its expertise to provide the backdrop to the opening and closing of the Invictus Games in Sydney. The company has involved in the opening ceremony on the forecourt of the Sydney Opera House, projection mapping onto the sails of Sydney Opera House and the closing ceremony at Qudos Bank Arena, located at Sydney Olympic Park. (Image: TDC) The opening ceremony brought together LED Screens at the Sydney Opera House forecourt with projection mapping...

Christmas lighting has been an essential element for the holidays. This year, London Luton Airport has created a lightshow involving an airplane. To celebrate the airport’s 80th anniversary and the completion of its three year redevelopment, easyJet provided an A320 Airbus which was wrapped with vivid colored Christmas lights, creating a delightful holiday mood for the staffs and passengers. (Image: London Luton Airport) The eye-catching show used over 850,000 choreographed light sequences and 1.5 miles of LED micro bulbs with are synchronized to the sound of...

Macroblock, the LED driver IC supplier, announced that it has broken through the production bottleneck of Mini LED products and expects to begin volume manufacturing in 1Q19. According to Macroblock, its flip-chip Mini LED performs better in luminous efficacy, heat dissipation and light distribution uniformity compared to the conventional package method. The company said that it has solved the production difficulties of Mini LED products with a production yield rate of 99.99 percent. Macroblock’s driver IC was adopted by Samsung for its LED cinem...

The Ferdinand-Braun-Institut, Leibniz-Institut fuer Hoechstfrequenztechnik (FBH) is a Berlin-based electronic and optical research institute. It is going to present its novel diode lasers and advancements, as well as its results and progresses in UV LEDs at Photonics West 2019. The institute will showcase its capabilities from design through chips to modules and prototype systems. One focus of FBH's R&D is on high-power diode lasers used in materials processing both directly and as pump sources. The pulse laser sources of FBH delivers 200 ps to 20 ns ...

Israel-based LiDAR solution provider Innoviz Technologies announced the achievements of its expansion into four new countries and advance of manufacturing. With the significant movements, the company aims to provide LiDAR solutions available and affordable at a massive scale for the prospering market. Innoviz has expanded globally with the opening of offices in four new countries including the U.S., Germany, China and Japan, with additional expansions planned in 2019. These regions were selected based on their proximity to areas of high market demand and/or existing cus...

The Guangzhou International Lighting Exhibition will return to the China Import and Export Fair Complex in Guangzhou, China, from June 9 ‒ 12, 2019. Continuing to serve as the most influential lighting and LED event in Asia, the 24th edition of the show will adopt a new show theme ‒ THINKLIGHT: Envisage The Next Move. The last edition of the show emphasised the importance of embracing change in the lighting industry, whether that be in the shape of smart and connected lighting, LED miniaturisation or even human-centric lighting. The lighting supply c...

Bowery Farming, an indoor autonomous farming startup from New York, has raised US$ 90 million in Series B funding from investors including GV (formerly Google Ventures). and CEO of Uber, Dara Khosrowshahi. The company began operating in February 2017 and has opened two vertical farming facilities near New York since then. Bowery Farming applies technologies including robotics, machine learning and predictive analytics to autonomously operate the growing conditions for the crops. Vegetables are grown with controlled environment with optimized LED lighting spectr...

Velodyne Lidar announced its collaboration with Nikon as the optical technology company invests US$ 25 million in Velodyne. The two companies have begun discussions for a multifaceted business alliance. The purpose of the strategic partnership is to combine Nikon’s optical and precision technologies with Velodyne’s sensor technology. According to Velodyne, the relationship aims to advance the timeline for manufacturing and mass production of LiDAR for the autonomous and advanced safety global market. The parties have begun investigating a wide-ranging business...

Lighting supplier Zumtobel Group announced a grand opening of its new lighting center in Paris. The space is designed as an open area that invites customers to exchange and network. The Zumtobel Group opened its new Light Centre on a surface of 450m² at 10 rue d’Uzès in the 2nd arrondissement in Paris on December 13th 2018. In this new Light Centre, the Zumtobel Group showcases its broad portfolio in the field of professional lighting along with the associated services in the new premises, allowing light to be experienced in its many different fascinati...

TSLC Corporation, a subsidiary of SemiLEDs, launched sampling of its tri-color Mini LED series, targeted to provide LED display manufacturers with surface-mounting (SMT) compatible devices. The first product in the tri-color multi pixel series is a 16-pixel RGB array component, “4x4RGBminiArray.” The component simplifies the process of surface-mounting and increase the throughput over 15 times. The production cost is thus reduced. As the commercial markets strive to deliver top quality images, the pixel number required for displays increases drast...

Having looked back at the industry updates of Micro LED technology, let’s keep on reviewing the technology breakthroughs of Micro LED in the past year. KAIST Team Develops Flexible Vertical Micro LED to Cure Hair loss Problem In January, a researcher team at KAIST announced the development of flexible vertical micro LEDs (f-VLEDs). These f-VLEDs achieved optical power density (30 mW/mm2) three times higher than that of lateral Micro LEDs and can be applied to optogenetics for controlling the behavior of neuron cells and brains with...

German company TRUMPF is going to acquire Philips Photonics, the VCSEL production units of Royal Philips, to expand its product portfolio for 3D sensing and data transmission applications. Back in November Philips Photonics announced a milestone of shipping one billion VCSELs and soon after that the company was said to have increased the capacity of VCSEL production in Ulm, Germany. And now it is selling 100 percent of the operation to TRUMPF. The two companies are planning to finish the operation transaction by the second quarter of 2019 and neith...

Sensor solutions provider ams announced that it will exhibit new sensing technologies for the mobile devices, computing, consumer electronics and automotive sectors at CES 2019. With its theme, ‘Sensing is Life,’ ams is going to introduce sensor solutions including medical-grade wearable devices that monitor blood pressure; 3D technology for smart phones, computing, automotive and robotics; behind OLED solutions for bezel-less phones; color sensors that enhance pictures to professional levels; earbud technology for a relaxing ANC experience (digital and analog) ...

Environmental Lights launched its new line of silicone neon, ProFlex LED Neon. ProFlex LED Neon utilizes a flexible silicone housing to provide a greater level of UV protection and weather resistance than standard PVC-based neon. It is specifically designed for outdoor lighting applications. (Image: Environmental Lighting) "ProFlex LED Neon raises the bar in LED neon lighting applications," stated CEO of Environmental Lights Jamison Day. President Jordan Brooks added, "It is the ideal outdoor neon solution thanks to its durab...

For the LED and panel industry, the year of 2018 had a dramatic start with Samsung’s revealing of its Micro LED TV “The Wall” at the CES show. Since then, players in the industry have been releasing their achievements related to the next generation display technology. Several innovative solutions and applications have been disclosed in the past year including large size displays and wearable devices. As LEDinside has continued to track the progress of Micro LED development, we would like to list the significant breakthroughs and industry updates...

The U.S.-based LiDAR startup, AEye, announced the second close of its Series B financing, bringing the company’s total funding to over US$60 million. AEye Series B included global automotive OEM, Tier 1 and Tier 2 strategic investors Hella Ventures, SUBARU-SBI Innovation Fund, LG Electronics, and SK Hynix. AEye previously announced that the round was led by Taiwania Capital and other investors. Series B will be used to scale AEye’s operations to meet global demand for its artificial perception systems for both ADAS and Mobilit...

On the way for Osram’s high-tech company transformation, smart lighting and building applications are parts of the core development of the company. It has announced the launch of its IoT platform for the lighting and building market. Lightelligence is the platform developed by Osram which includes a far-reaching development environment for IoT solutions and applications. Users of the platform can draw on a fully developed software infrastructure and are not required to set up anything themselves. The IoT platform is much like an app store, where users can individually a...

Taiwan-based optical disc maker RITEK announced that its subsidiary, RiTdisplay and Luminit, a light sharping diffuser supplier in the U.S., are going to set up a joint venture in Taiwan focusing on automotive lighting. The RITEK group began its business in optical disc production and has expanded its operation to storage media, nano-technology, OLED displays and others. RiTdisplay is the subsidiary of RITEK which focuses on OLED development and production. On the other hand, Luminit specializes in light sharping technology for lighting, display, automot...

LED lighting industry has been in a Golden Era in recent years as the global lighting companies have poured in the ranks of LED lighting to seek a good fortune. However, opportunities always coexist with challenges: The competition of LED lighting industry is increasingly fierce, and most companies are at a loss when it comes to price competition. Some overseas clients hope to enter the high-end market to get better profits, but failed in the end due to the weakness of brand influence. One trader from South America is facing with the dilemma. At the 2017 Spring Canton ...

Epitaxy wafers are key to the technology development of Micro LED displays. As Micro LED chips are extremely small, the quality of epitaxy wafers including wavelength uniformity and low defect becomes critical for further production process. AIXTRON, the German-based technology company, has illustrated how its MOCVD systems can significantly improve wavelength uniformity and decrease defect density of Micro LED epitaxy wafer with its article, titled “AIXTRON’s MOCVD Technology Breakthrough for Micro LED High Volume Manufacturing....

Developing cost-effective methods for transferring Micro LEDs is critical for the commercialization of Micro LED display technology. How to accurately assemble numerous tiny sized Micro LEDs to targeted places efficiently has been one of the biggest challenges for worldwide Micro LED technology developers. Uniqarta, a U.S.-based startup who focuses on developing innovative assembly methods for integrated circuit (IC), has shared with LEDinside how its laser-based transfer technology can be applied for Micro LEDs. Its article, titled “Laser-Enabled E...

The key for commercializing Micro LED technology is to holistically improve the manufacture process and to achieve cost-effective high volume production of Micro LED displays. Major industry players in the production chain from the LED chip makers, transfer technology developers to panel producers and end products brands have all dedicated themselves to work on solutions for the goal. Tesoro Scientific, established by Francois J. Henley in 2017, focuses on the enhancement of Micro LED production. Its research paper, titled “Novel In-Process Functional Tes...

By the end of last month, Bloomberg reported that Bain Capital, a U.S.-based private equity firm, has been eyeing a buyout of Osram. Soon after that, another private equity company, Carlyle, reportedly joined the list of potential bidders for the German lighting technology group, according to Financial Times. The report of Financial Times noted that two people directly involved in the situation have confirmed Carlyle’s interest in the buyout of Osram. But neither Carlyle nor Osram commented on the information. (Image: Osram) Osram has been through a fina...

Osram has debuted new VCSELs for applications like 3D scanning and imaging. The new products, PLPVCQ 850 and the PLPVCQ 940, are the latest additions to Osram’s Bidos product family. VCSELs combine the high power density and simple packaging of an IRED with the spectral width and speed of a laser. With the focus on high tech development, Osram Opto Semiconductor has targeted VCSEL application include machine vision or facial recognition, as well as object or architectural scanning that involves mapping an area in 3D and positioning virtual fu...

LiDAR startup Luminar announced that it has collaborated with Autonomous Intelligent Driving (AID), the subsidiary of Audi. Through the partnership, Luminar is providing its forward-facing and long-range LiDAR technology to accelerate plans towards AID’s first fully autonomous deployments in 2021. AID is a startup founded by Audi with the purpose to provide autonomous driving technologies for the Volkswagen Group. Since the company launched in March last year, AID tapped Luminar as its first partner for realizing its vision to deploy true and safe au...