At LEDforum 2009, which took place on November 25, 2009, LEDinside Research Director Roger Chu proposed his viewpoint on the LED industry trend in 2010. He pointed out that high brightness LEDs, used in large-size backlights and lightings, will be the key growth driver of the LED market – with compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of large-size backlight reaching 73%, and that of lighting market up by approximately 32%.

As for China’s LED streetlight market, he projected that the market will not witness explosive growth until 2011/2012, as standards have yet to be established and China’s government strategies veered.

In the backlight market, the sharp YoY price drop of LEDs for backlight applications prompted more notebook brand vendors to adopt LED backlight. However, as LED chips are in tight supply in 2009, the price decline was in fact more modest compared to that of previous years.

According to LEDinside’s latest price information, LEDs for notebook backlight are priced at about $0.04~0.1, and the LEDs for TV backlight are $0.2. Chu amplifies that as the IT segment has only begun to adopt LED backlight, price decline of backlight LEDs will be limited in the next two quarters.

Analyzing market demand, LEDs for notebook backlight has reached its mature stage, with 61% the penetration rate in 2009, and the figure is forecast to reach 83% in 2010. Meanwhile, the adoption of LED backlight in monitors may be constrained by variables such as LED supply shortage. That said, if LED prices fall substantially in 2011, penetration of LED backlight in monitors may potentially witness the same growth pattern as that of notebooks. Finally, the penetration rate of LED backlight in TVs will be between 10-15% in 2010. As a result, the shortage in chip supply is expected to ease in the second half of 2010.

In high-power LED lighting application – LED manufacturers continue to roll out new specifications, though the reduction in price quotes is limited, there is still room for decline in price per lumen. Additionally, the Japanese government subsidized firms with energy-saving products, creating massive demand for LED lighting in Japan’s commercial space and reinforcing the overall market demand.

Chu further noted that according to China’s “ten thousand lights in ten cities” project, more than one million streetlights are expected to be installed by the beginning of 2010. Yet, based on LEDinside’s statistics, less than 300 thousand streetlights were installed in 2009. This shows that LED streetlight is still in its introduction stage, and that its quality and quantity still need to stand the test of time.

Furthermore, as the government holds a rather conservative attitude towards installing LED streetlights in the cities, China’s LED streetlights are only calculated at about 400 thousand lamps in 2010. Not until the standards are set in 2011-2012 will demand for LED streetlights surge.