Localization of packaging equipment boosts LED industry reform

After years of development in the LED lighting industry, my country's LED lighting industry has achieved a qualitative breakthrough. Products and markets have become more orderly, and semiconductor lighting technology has continued to mature, especially in terms of large-scale production. Our automated production equipment will play a very important role in the future development of LED lighting. The continuous advancement of LED lighting technology also requires the love, prosperity and promotion of the equipment industry.

Localization of equipment boosts independent innovation

Generally speaking, the overall level of my country's packaging equipment lags behind that of foreign countries, which seriously restricts the improvement of the competitiveness of my country's LED industry, especially the LED lighting industry. Equipment is favored to be imported, investment in process technology research is insufficient, and the overall level of technology is not high. This situation seriously hinders the development of the industry. In order to improve industrial competitiveness, promote LED technological change and strengthen independent innovation in the packaging equipment manufacturing industry, it is currently the top priority for the development of the LED industry.

At present, our country has successfully conquered the key equipment for the production of LED epitaxial chips - MOCVD, and realized the localization of MOCVD. It not only got rid of the monopoly situation of foreign countries, but also reduced the production cost of LED, so that domestic enterprises no longer "look back and sigh" in the face of fierce competition, realized independent innovation initiative, and improved the development of domestic equipment to a big level. General Manager Feng Baihua of Shenzhen Sany Lianguang Automation Equipment Co., Ltd. said, “It does not mean that imported equipment is good equipment.It’s not that our domestic equipment is not good. Equipment can be regarded as an investment product rather than a consumer product. The equipment must be simple and stable. Such domestic high-quality equipment can more conveniently realize the demands of enterprises. "Currently, domestic MOCVD has been used by several epitaxial chip manufacturers. Kang Jian, general manager of Yuanrong Optoelectronics, also told reporters from Sosou LED Network: "At present, many domestic companies have produced MOCVD equipment, and many epitaxial chip companies are trialling it. The star of hope for the localization of major equipment has been born, and it is gradually forming a spark that will start a prairie fire. "The emergence of domestic equipment, due to regional relationships and the service attitude of manufacturers, has directly led to an improvement in the service attitude of imported equipment manufacturers and a reduction in prices. Especially the emergence of domestic MOCVD equipment (although it has not yet formed a climate) has caused a significant drop in the price of imported MOCVD equipment and a substantial improvement in service attitude. Manufacturing companies have directly benefited.
In the upstream field, in addition to the core equipment MOCVD, there are also dicing machines, dry etching machines, uniform glue development equipment, grinders, cleaning machines, dryers, evaporation machines, slitting machines, spotting machines, sorting machines, etc. Although some of them have been domestically produced, for example, 90% of the market for dicing machines has so far been Occupied by Han's and De'Longhi; 60% of the dry etching machine market has been occupied by Northern Microelectronics; uniform glue and development equipment has been gradually used by major domestic chip manufacturers. By the end of 2013, the domestic customer share in the LED field has reached more than 60% of the equipment of other equipment manufacturers.All are Taiwanese or imported equipment. For example, CLP 45 and Shenzhen Silicon Electric are also actively promoting point testing machine sorting equipment, but the overall market share of domestic equipment does not exceed 10%. In addition, these equipments have high R&D funds, long R&D cycles, and rapid technological updates, and are difficult to market. Domestic equipment does not have mass production inspection and improvement after feedback, so it is slightly insufficient in stability, which also causes chip manufacturers to lack confidence in localized equipment. Many companies have a smooth time sending prototypes for demo, but face many difficulties once they are promoted in batches.