Organized by Semi Taiwan, the 2017 IR/UV Summit was held on April 12 in Taipei, Taiwan as part of the agenda of LED Taiwan 2017. The summit was chaired by Charles Li, CEO of PlayNitride Inc. and gathered experts to discuss the latest development trends regarding IR/UV LEDs. 

 Charles Li, CEO of PlayNitride Inc. (LEDinside)

Currently, infrared is mainly used for lighting, identification and sensing purposes, said Lu Zhiqiang, Assistant Manager of R&D Center at Epistar Corporation. In addition, infrared wavelengths span from 850nm, 910nm, 940nm to 1400nm, allowing a wide range of applications. For instance, due to the prevalence of mobile payment, the demand for iris recognition solutions is expected to pick up rapidly, and Epistar already provides related products such as 42 x 42 mil IR LED chips to cater to the growing need.

 Lu Zhiqiang, Assistant Manager of R&D Center at Epistar. (LEDinside)

Lu added that products with longer wavelengths can be combined with InP materials and be used for measuring blood oxygen level and blood glucose. Nowadays, the demand for high brightness IR LED chips continues to increase, and Epistar’s 850nm and 940nm models can achieve 500mW output at 350mA, which demonstrate the company’s unparalleled capability in developing IR LED products. 

Sander Su, Senior Director Global Marketing Division & NBD Division at Liteon, pointed out that IR will be the white-hot technology in 2017 and will be widely used in wearables, security surveillance devices and VR/AR devices. For instance, in the future, VR headsets will use multiple IR LEDs, which will further increase the demand for IR LEDs. 

Sander Su, Senior Director Global Marketing Division & NBD Division at Liteon. (LEDinside)

Moreover, in terms of biometric applications, in 2016, around 65% of them were consumer products, 15% were industrial goods, and 20% were residential products, while iris/facial recognition solutions only accounted for 7%. However, as iris scanners are increasingly being introduced into smartphones, LEDinside estimates that the global market scale of IR LED and IR laser components used in iris and facial recognition solutions will reach US$827 million by 2025.

As for product design, high power LED components, a CCD image sensor and a proximity sensor will be jointly placed on the front of a smartphone. Su also stated that although there are many different types of IR LED products, there is no one-size-fits-all solution when it comes to product design. The target market of each application varies as well. 

Lastly, the summit invited Jun Miyauchi, Product Management Team Leader of UV LED at Nikkiso, to talk about the Japanese manufacture's developments in UV LEDs. Nikkiso offers UV LED components, modules and system designs. Mr. Miyauchi said in 2017, the company releases an SMD LED sample at 285 nm with 45 mW of power and plans to deliver mass-produced model to customers later this year. He estimated that Nikkiso will further release SMD samples with at least 30% increase in power. 

Jun Miyauchi, Product  Management Team Leader at Nikkiso. (LEDinside)

Regarding UV LED products for water treatment, Nikkiso’s subsidiary AquiSense provides water, air, and surface disinfection applications utilizing UV-C LED technologies. Among them, its portable and cost-effective water treatment devices are based on Nikkiso’s UV-C LED products and air cooled systems, Mr. Miyauchi concluded.