Zhou Xuejun predicts that next year will still be a painful period for the LED industry

Research institute TrendForce held an LED industry seminar in Taipei on the 23rd. Zhou Xuejun, marketing director of Philips Asia, said that although LED prices have plummeted and there is still room for price reduction next year, LED still has a huge application market that has not yet been penetrated. It is expected that next year will still be a painful period for the industry, and companies that survive the pain will be able to taste the good things.

Zhou Xuejun bluntly stated that the current LED supply and demand market is still oversupplied, so prices may still fall next year. As LED prices are already selling by the pound, more application fields are expected to switch to LED products under cost considerations. In addition, CSP (chip size packaging) uses flip-chip technology to effectively reduce costs. In addition to being used for lighting flash in Apple phones, CSP is also used in TV backlight applications this year.

Zhou Xuejun said that the application of flip-chip technology has increased to large TVs and 4K high-end models, which is expected to replicate the previous LED product application side's development model of medium-to-high output value. As TVs use more flip-chip LEDs, it will effectively reduce manufacturers' manufacturing costs and make up for the lighting side. The amount of CSP used in high-end backlights is bound to increase next year, and the market output value is expected to replicate the previous history of products switching to medium power. Prices will continue to fall next year, but output value is still expected to grow.

LED factories still have to face a cold winter in the industry. Zhou Xuejun pointed out that due to the rapid decline in prices, you can buy two LED lamps for US$5 in the US market this year. Last year, the price of a single lamp was about US$7-10. In 2008, it was 30 yuan per lamp. Although LED sales continue to be painful in terms of weight, there are many application areas that can be developed after the sharp drop in costs. It is expected that the speed of LEDs replacing traditional lamps will accelerate in three years to reach a peak.

In addition, the trend of lighting interconnection will make LED light engines a future trend. In the future, light engines can have a lot of added value and actions, becoming an important unit of smart lighting. In response to changes in lighting fixtures, it will help us enter the world of IoT (Internet of Things). It is expected that LEDs will move toward modularization and miniaturization.

For more information about the LED network, please click on the Sosoled website (www.sosoled.com) or follow the WeChat public account.