According to TrendForce latest report Gold+ Member: Global LED Industry Data Base and LED Player Movement Quarterly Update, the COVID-19 pandemic is expected to be eased in 2021. Automotive LED, video wall and lighting market demand is expected to recover, and demand for Mini LEDs will take off as well. In addition, horticultural lighting and UV LED market demand will consistently grow quickly. According to TrendForce, the LED market value in 2021 is expected to increase to 16.531 billion.

TrendFoce summarized seven major applications.

• Medium- and Large-sized Backlight: With the increase in TV/NB/monitor shipments, LED market value amounted to USD 1.396 billion in 2020. Manufacturers including Nichia, Seoul Semiconductor, Samsung LED, Lextar and AOT enjoyed significant revenue growth in backlight LED business in 2020.
   
• Video Wall: The demands in applications such as commercial leasing, sports venues, corporate meeting rooms and outdoor digital displays will gradually recover in 2021. In addition, raw material shortage and price increase affected the stocking in 1Q21, which also means that video wall players take optimistic attitude toward market demand of 2021.
   
• LED chip with size ranging from 75-300μm is defined as Mini LED. Mini LED products fall into two categories: self-emitting display (video wall) and backlight application. Driven by brand manufacturers such as Apple, Samsung and LG, Mini LED market value in 2021 will increase by 2.4 times.
   
• Automotive Lighting and Automotive Display: Global automotive market demand has fully recovered since 4Q20, most LED players extended product lead time. LED players indicated that double booking might happen in the near future. Thereby, they will make decisions in light of the actual booking order quantity to see the possibility of increasing prices.
   
• General Lighting: Following a significant market demand recession in 2020, lighting LED market demand is expected to increase as the governments release fiscal stimulus measures. In addition, with price increases on materials and LED chip, LED package manufacturers have increased the lighting LED price in order to maintain the basic gross margine. According to TrendForce, lighting package manufacturers will actively develop high-quality and high CRI lighting LED, human centric lighting, plant growth lighting and other niche lighting application markets to reach revenue growth.
   
• Horticultural Lighting: According TrendForce analysis, horticultural lighting LED market demand enjoyed the fast growth in 2020. This was because growing cannabis in North America has been legalized, and the market size of cannabis for medical and recreational use has been rapidly increased, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, the pandemic exerts an increasingly obvious influence on food supply chain, contributing to a new round of development in building indoor vertical farms, which boosts the demand for replacing and purchasing lighting devices. Therefore, the global horticultural lighting LED market value in 2020 has enjoyed a 41% increase YoY.
   
• Invisible LED Market: The infrared LED market mainly includes applications such as security surveillance, 2.5D face recognition, driver monitoring systems and occupancy monitoring system, eye tracking, etc. Furthermore, in terms of UV-A LED market applications, curing market demand has increased largely in 2021, with the main growth drivers of 3D printing, LCD lamination machine, wafer application and air purification markets. Owing to COVID-19, the awareness of purification has increased significantly among manufacturers. In addition, UV-C LED product optical power has grown. According to TrendForce, Chinese, European, Korean and Japanese brands are planning to introduce UV-C LEDs in their new home appliances. At the same time, UV-C LEDs will also have chance to be introduced into flowing water applications, manufacturing facilities and factory automation applications. Therefore, UV-C LED market demand has performed well.

Analyst: Joanne, Allen / TrendForce

For more details on the LED demand and supply market, please stay tuned for TrendForce Gold+ Member: Global LED Industry Data Base and LED Player Movement Quarterly Update!