It's Time for the LED industry to Tackle Compatibility

The story behind LED development—only the 4th lighting technology developed in human history—is remarkable. The potential ahead of LED lighting to deliver real and measurable advantages—to save energy, last years longer, significantly lower bottom-line costs—is limitless.  But for it to be the next great defining feature of the lighting landscape, LED lighting needs to work.

Yes, work. That’s precisely the question LED end-users, specifiers, designers, utilities and regulatory agencies ask themselves before adopting LED options for their stores and retail fronts, offices and homes. Will these alternative lighting offerings achieve what they promise?

And the simple, scary truth facing the LED industry today is often, there’s no guarantee they will.

Today, legacy infrastructure—the transformers, fixtures, and control devices already incorporated into built environments—creates unique and challenging compatibility interferences with widespread LED adoption.  

What we’ve seen to date in our current, ongoing preliminary phase of LED adoption is “plug and play” applications--a customer simply installs an LED bulb into an existing fixture. Sometimes that fixture works with the LED bulb’s mechanical, electric, and thermal requirements; sometimes it doesn’t; and sometimes there are mixed results. The effect? Consumer uncertainty.  

Any new technology only has a small window to prove its value. Second chances with first impressions do not exist—which is why in any market; it’s essential to capitalize on the moment of market introduction. It’s an opportunity—and a test—to gain the trust of the consumer on the first try.  

The LED industry, peers, partners, and competitors, must work together to ensure full compatibility with the millions of lamps, dimmers, transformers, and fixtures on the market.

When looking at the compatibility problem, there are three separate issues to address: 1. Electrical compatibility; 2. Mechanical compatibility; and 3. Thermal compatibility.  

Electric Compatibility. Common voltages in lighting systems are significantly higher than LED requirements. As a result, the transformer and dimmers often don’t operate consistently, or properly.  Frequently this causes the LED to flicker and dim erratically, one lamp powering off before another, or the LED not even powering on at all.

Mechanical Compatibility. Problems arise when LEDs do not match the size and dimensions of traditional lamps.  It’s simply a matter of fitting a square into a round hole—the LED does not fix the legacy fixture’s width or height.

Thermal Compatibility. Traditional light sources and LEDs operate at dramatically different temperatures.  While some halogen lamps operate at 200 degrees Celsius, LED lamps must operate between a specific thermal temperature to ensure long life and safety standards.  In much of the legacy fixture infrastructure, there’s no means to dissipate heat in the bulb design.  

Let me be clear. Compatibility is the number one compelling problem facing the entire LED industry today. No end-user, designer, specifier will–or should—care what promises and potential LED technology holds in the future, if it doesn’t meet their needs in the present.

So while others keep the issue in the dark, Ledzworld works to guarantee our technology fits legacy lighting infrastructure. How? By proofing every one of our LED solutions against hundreds of the most commonly used dimmer, transformer and fixture applications.  It’s painstaking work, but it’s this behind-the-scenes effort that gives our customers the peace of mind they need, and deserve.

We’re also innovating LED drivers that guarantee our lamps are hassle-free, and work seamlessly on a wide range of magnetic and electric transformers and in combination with commonplace dimmers.

Recently, the company launched a breakthrough MR16 LED lamp with our patented Chameleon driver.  The Chameleon driver self adjusts to its environment by first detecting the transformer type, then analyzing its waveform, and finally adjusting itself to make a perfect electrical fit with that particular transformer. This innovative driver makes the company's MR16 LED retrofit lamps truly "plug and play" devices that can be used in a wide variety of transformer and dimmer combinations.  Anywhere, every time.

What’s more, the CTR functionality implemented in Ledzworld's Chameleon driver design also provides an intelligent temperature control monitoring system. The temperature control system acts as a watchdog by continuously measuring the ambient temperature inside the driver compartment by utilizing a built-in thermal sensor embedded into the Chameleon driver chipset.

Bottom-line, our lamps work on the spectrum of magnetic transformers, in combination with most commonly used leading edge dimmers, and with a large variety of electronic transformers paired with commonly used trailing edge dimmers.

Ledzworld set out to revolutionize the lighting industry with one unshakable commitment: to develop, design, and manufacture LED lighting that meets—and exceeds—all LED technology expectations. But that starts with ensuring that our technologically progressive, best-in-class lamps work as well with older infrastructure as they do with the new.  

So that a few bad actors don’t spoil LEDs reputation, it’s time for the entire LED industry to tackle compatibility, together.  

China Electric Enters LED Lighting Field with Takeover of GIO Optoelectronics

China Electric Manufacturing Corp. has announced its acquisition of GIO Optoelectronics Corp. in hopes to meet their operation goal of increasing LED lighting revenue share by 20 percent next year. The company announced yesterday its acquisition of 160 million shares at NT $ 0.8 per share with allocated funds reaching NT $83.9 million. Main shareholder of GIO, Chimei Corp. sold its 39.2 percent stake to China Electric and relinquished chairmanship. China Electric will join GIO in LED lighting product R&D, but will not interfere with the company’s operations.

With poor tablet manufacturing prices this year, China Electric has slashed backlight application prices. The company has therefore temporarily ceased OEM for backlight applications due to low profitability, leading to a drop in operation revenue for the year. October consolidated revenue reached NT $207 million, a yearly decrease of 63.24 percent. Consolidated revenue for the first 10 months of 2013 was NT $2.77 billion, a yearly decrease of 53.24 percent.

China Electric’s lighting brand TOA is a conventional lighting leader in Taiwan.

Intematix Introduces Remote Phosphor Product for 150W LED Retrofit Lamps

Intematix Corp, a leading innovator of patented phosphor solutions for high-quality LED lighting, today announced the volume shipments of their remote phosphor component that enables 150W equivalent LED retrofit lamps. This production release adds to the product family already enabling 40W, 60W, 75W and 100W bulb replacements all using a similar omnidirectional form factor.

As global government regulations phase out incandescent lamps, these remote phosphor components streamline access to high quality, efficient lighting in these popular lumen output ranges for use in residential and commercial applications. In addition, this innovative form factor delivers an incandescent-like 325 degree light distribution pattern in contrast to many LED replacement bulbs on the market.

“By applying this remote phosphor technology to the high end of the light bulb output range, we show 38% higher lumen output than bulbs available today,” said Julian Carey, Senior Director of Strategic Marketing at Intematix. “We are already seeing newly available, 2200-plus lumen LED light bulbs worldwide using this technology.”

Remote phosphor is a lighting system architecture where a separate phosphor component is powered by blue LEDs. LED light bulbs use this architecture and the increased light extraction it enables to reduce LED component count and costs. Lighting uniformity and consistency are also improved and supply chains are simplified. Intematix has launched this specific ChromaLit® Contour product with a light bulb reference design that includes the following features:

• Three-way switching mode up to 2200 lumens
• 2700K, 3000K & 5000K color temperature options
• Standard color rendering options of 80 and 90CRI
• 30 watts power consumption
• 325 degree, omni-directional light meeting ENERGY STAR® requirements
• Up to 25,000 hour lifetime
• 150W equivalent LED light bulbs utilizing Intematix’s patented ChromaLit remote phosphor are now available at major US retail outlets. 

Japanese LED Market Size Doubles

Over the past few years, Japan has seen an upsurge in energy conservation awareness. In the wake of the Tohoku earthquake in 2011, the government has even proposed plans for a “low-carbon society”. LED products have since experienced rapid popularization becoming the poster child for energy saving products. A recent survey shows the Japanese LED market size will undergo explosive growth in 2012 of 195 percent to $420.4 billion Japanese yen (US $4.2 billion),as reported by Liberty Times.

The LED market experience exponential growth last year according to Yano Research’s “2013 LED Lighting Market Research Findings” as published in a Japanese media source. The market this year continues to have high energy saving demands. Driven by LED market’s rapid growth, it is forecasted that the market scale for general lighting products will increase.

High popularization for energy saving efficiency

The main selling point of LEDs is that they save around 40 percent more electricity than florescent bulbs with a lifespan of more than 40,000 hours, which comes to over 10 years. In highly energy conscience Japan, popularization of LEDs began much earlier  than other countries with various related merchandise available on the shelves of home appliance hypermarkets.

The Chinese LED lighting market in comparison has only just begun popularization this year. Chinese LED lighting demands could increase in 2015 to $100 billion yen  according to forecasts by market research companies. Japanese manufacturers hope to take advantage of the opportunity and snare a large chunk of the Chinese market.

Competition is becoming fiercer with the increasing number of companies  entering LED lighting. Companies are straining to accelerate development of product distinction from their competitors to keep the market from transforming into pure price competition. LED lamps are no longer just lighting fixtures, but value added interior decoration pieces with aesthetic design and functional value. 

Japanese LED manufacture Koizumi has recently released the industry’s first lighting simulation app called Virtual Lighting Design where users can pick from various locations (bedroom, entrance hall, and hallway), room size, material for flooring and walls, and more to test LED lighting luminosity before deciding to purchase products.

The LED lighting market is expected to continually expand, but whether companies will be able to release products with features aside from energy-efficient and long-life products will become an important condition for companies vying for market share.

Guangdong Still Under LED Industry Oversupply Pressure

China’s National Development and Reform Commission and others announced the country’s latest strategic new industry development report at the China Hi-tech Fair on Nov. 16, 2013. Most industries remain small in Guangdong Province’s eight strategic new industries, according to the province’s latest strategic new industry report.

Strategic new industry sizes in Guangdong Province remained small, due to difficulties in expanding the domestic market and other factors. Different levels of oversupply issues have surfaced in the LED and photovoltaic industry. In addition, innovative technologies are mostly still at the stage of tracking and imitation, and lacks core technologies developed in-house. Take the Guangdong Province for example, on the surface it is a livid and rising industry, but in reality the industry’s future is in the hands of large companies, such as Google and Qualcomm that have control over operation system and core chip technologies.

Shenzhen strategic new industry is also facing lack of core technology. In addition, the city’s report also admitted nurturing a market is a long and tedious road, and tension in the industry’s developable space is also affecting potential development. 

PIDA’s Unveils Top 10 LED Lighting Manufacturers List

Photonics Industry and Technology Development Association (PIDA) compiled a list of the top 10 global LED lighting manufactures, according to Economic Daily News, with international heavy weights Philips, Osram, and Panasonic among the top three. No Taiwanese manufacturers made the list. Taiwanese lighting brands currently include China Electric, Everlight, Delta, Tatung, Adata, Tsannkuen, and Leotek.

PIDA top 10 global LED lighting manufacturers in order are Philips, Osram, Panasonic, Toshiba, Cree, ENDO, Zumtobel, Koizumi, Iris Ohyama, and Sharp. Global LED lighting output value reached NT $11.5 billion (US $390 million) with a penetration rate of 11 percent

PIDA looks optimistically on business opportunities in the start of 2014, when Europe and North America markets begin to replace most commonly used 40-60W incandescent bulbs in households. Global LED market penetration rates were pushed up by U.S. companies that have slowly switched from conventional lighting to LED, such as GE, and by domestic Chinese manufacturers and OEMs that are global powerhouses for lighting manufacturing. Taiwanese manufacturers are all rushing to grasp this business opportunity whether it is through their own brands or as OEMs. 

Sony Announces Latest OLED Displays

Sony has come out with new professional OLED-based computer monitors. The new models (PVM-A250, 25" and PVM-A170, 17") are approximately 40% thinner in depth and 40% lighter in weight compared to previous Sony models. The newly designed monitors were the result of Sony completely re-engineering them. Sony reportedly made numerous changes from the chassis to the OLED panel module's structure to the signal processing board, material and parts. The monitors have also reduced power consumption by 9% compared to previous versions of its high-end Trimaster El OLED monitors.

"Higher resolution content creation – 4K and beyond – requires monitors with larger screen sizes for accurate color evaluation on site," said Daniel Dubreuil, senior product marketing manager, professional monitors, Sony Europe."But bigger monitors are harder to carry and take up more space. These new models have the screen size needed for critical evaluation, with a thinner and lighter design that’s perfect for live broadcast and outdoor shooting. They even have a handle for easy carrying."

The monitors improvements include an I/P conversion system that delivers automatically optimized signal processing according to input signals, with low latency (less than 0.5 field). The new monitors will be available in January, 2014. Retail prices for the 17" and 25" OLED monitors will be well over $4 thousand and $6 thousand respectively. So don't plan on having that monitor added to your gaming system unless you have lots of money to spend.