Looking for the next new growth point for LEDs is becoming the only variable in the new turning point of the LED industry in 2020.
2016 is the new year of LED niche market. Emerging markets such as automotive LED, UV LED, IR LED, and plant lighting are developing rapidly.
Among them, the UV LED has been rapidly converted and utilized with the development of the layout enterprises in the past two years, and the market demand is expected to be released to a greater extent.
According to the High-tech Research Institute LED Research Institute (GGII), the global UV LED market will exceed $1 billion by 2020, with a compound annual growth rate of 44.3%.
From the technical level and market, the UV LED market can be divided into two parts: deep ultraviolet and near ultraviolet, respectively, because the technology, application and price difference between the two are very large. UV-LED product specifications can be divided into three categories: UV-A (long-wavelength ultraviolet light, 320-400 nm), UV-B (medium-wavelength ultraviolet light, 280-320 nm) and UV-C (short-wavelength ultraviolet light 200-280 nm).
The oversupply and continuous low gross profit of the LED general lighting industry is one of the driving forces for the growing number of LED companies to enter the UV LED market.
According to Gaogong LED observation, in the past two years, well-known domestic and foreign manufacturers are vying to switch to the UV LED market, such as Nichia, Jingyuan Optoelectronics, Seoul Semiconductor, Hongli Zhihui, Guoxing Optoelectronics, Ruifeng Optoelectronics, etc. product.
"The gross profit margin of other mature LED markets is no longer the same. We estimate that more and more manufacturers will enter the UV LED market driven by high profits." Li Bingjie, chairman of Jingyuan Optoelectronics, said.
Indeed, the UV LED market is welcoming a new round of growth. On the one hand, the UV LED technology is constantly maturing, and on the other hand, the market demand for UV LED-based applications is becoming large-scale.
According to Tang Wenjun, director of crystal energy UV LED market, "Compared with domestic manufacturers, Nichia, LG, Seoul Semiconductor and other foreign manufacturers have earlier layout time in the UV LED field, and their product performance parameters are relatively high, plus their own brand advantages. Therefore, the price of the product is generally high."
The outbreak of the market requires a rapid decline in costs in the manufacturing sector.
Rui Xiaoguang, vice president and CTO of Ruifeng Optoelectronics, said, “At present, the manufacturers of UV LEDs are mainly divided into Taiwan, mainland China, South Korea, Europe, America and Japan. Domestic companies have certain advantages in cost and manufacturing, but in inorganic packaging. Technology needs to be improved, chip technology needs to be improved, especially short-wavelength chip resources are limited."
But like the traditional general lighting market, the UV LED demand market is also concentrated in China.
"At present, foreign manufacturers regard China as the main market, while domestic manufacturers' products are mainly used for domestic sales, so Chinese manufacturers have more advantages in terms of understanding of the market and matching of customers." Tang Wenjun said confidently. .
This requires continuous innovation of Chinese companies in terms of products and technologies.
Hongli Bingyi, a subsidiary of Hongli Zhihui Group, released the first series of all-inorganic package UV LED deep ultraviolet CMH6868, CMH6060 and CMH4545 in China last year.
Wu Li, a general manager of Hongli Bingyi, believes that “in essence, foreign UV LEDs currently have technological advantages, and Chinese companies are relatively weak. However, Chinese companies have strong learning ability and will appear like white LEDs in technology. The process of 'Peeping - Chasing - Peer - Beyond'. From the market side, the initiative is in the hands of Chinese companies and there are enough opportunities to try."
"In terms of the 360 ​​band, basically all of them need to use inorganic packaging. Now every manufacturer's solution is similar, but it is better to see which cost is better. Regarding UV curing, it needs band 360 to do it. At present, there is no chip in China. Manufacturers can provide suitable resources. At present, they mainly rely on Taiwanese and Korean manufacturers to do it." Xiao Xiaoming revealed to Gaogong LED.
In order to fully utilize its own silicon substrate technology, Crystal Energy has introduced a 365-430nm high-efficiency silicon substrate UVA LED product in 2015. Up to now, silicon substrate UVA LED products have been in the forefront of the market in the field of industrial light curing, nail beauty, anti-counterfeiting and other fields.
Manicure, ink, printing market will be the first to break out
It is undeniable that in recent years, UV LED curing technology has received a lot of attention, and in many applications, UV LED light sources have been gradually replaced by conventional mercury light sources.
"This year, the market share of UV LED will be rapidly improved. It is expected that the overall market will soon explode. In addition, it is believed that UV LED will be the first to break out in the fields of industrial light curing, exposure machine, and fluorescent agent detection." Tang Wenjun told Gaogong LED.
Yan Xiaoming also believes that “printing, manicure, plant lighting, UV curing applications have relatively low thresholds, limited chip resources, and efficiency can meet application level requirements through some integrated methods, which will become the first market to break out. â€
From the chip technology point of view, UVA LED (315-405nm) has begun to mature (but there are also many problems, such as the product's anti-static ability, low-band 365nm reliability is relatively poor); from the packaging technology point of view, UVA LEDs have relatively low requirements for packaging (except for industrial grade markets).
Wu Gan said frankly, "At present, everyone expects a high incidence of UV curing, but most of UV curing is applied to the industrial market, which is very demanding on the system."
However, the application of UV curing requires the entrant to have a good understanding of the LED environment, causing interference to ink (including varnish), power supply, and machine operation (current fluctuation, electromagnetic vibration, thermal disturbance of machine operation, etc.), oil and gas environment, printing material. , operating speed, cooling system, etc. should have sufficient understanding and corresponding solutions.
"So, I think that China's industrial-grade photocuring is difficult to explode in a short period of time. However, in some areas of photocuring, such as the simple system of ink, paint, paint light curing (especially handheld light curing field) will break out in advance. "Wu Gan said.
It is difficult to overcome the technical difficulties of domestic manufacturers.
Although the UV LED market has good prospects, the technical threshold is high.
In Wu Gan’s opinion, “If a company does not have enough time for R&D accumulation, it will be difficult to fully understand and skillfully apply UV LED. The UV LED system can adapt to its use environment is also a process that needs long-term accumulation and continuous improvement. On the application side, long-term and stable investment is required to cast quality products."
In terms of chip structure, most of the UV LEDs are used in directional optical systems. Therefore, the formal structure and the flip-chip structure are mostly unsuitable for UV LEDs, and the vertical structure is the first choice. Of course, the vertical structure is also a challenge for most Blu-ray chip manufacturers.
Tang Wenjun also said, "For enterprises, the technical difficulties in the field of UV-LED are mainly reflected in the vertical light and UV extension. At present, Jingneng Optoelectronics is also the only manufacturer in China that produces large-scale vertical UV chips."
From the perspective of the midstream package, the UV light emitted by the UV LED is very strong, which can break some of the chemical bonds in the organic packaging materials in the white light and RGB fields, causing the package to fail. In addition, the curing system of UV LED is basically different from the conduction and convection heat dissipation in the field of ice water cooling and lighting.
Hongli Bingyi specializes in the introduction of all-inorganic packaged UV LEDs for this problem, especially in the case of high energy density requirements, UV LEDs in all inorganic materials are particularly important.
In addition, the ice water cooling system will form a temperature difference of 15-20 degrees Celsius in the heat sink base and the external environment, and it is easy to form condensed water, so the airtightness of the packaged device is also important. "In the outdoor spotlight market, many companies have suffered from this loss. History should not repeat itself." Wu Gan mentioned.
To a certain extent, white light and RGB products are mature in both packaging technology and chip technology, and the resources are sufficient, and there is not much difference. Each manufacturer relies on large-scale “killingâ€.
"The application of UV LED in the LED field is not yet fully mature. Although the inorganic packaging technology route of UV LED is old, the process needs further improvement. The process and material matching also require a process. The raw UV UVC is mainly affected. Limited to chip performance and chip resource supply. "Xiao Xiaoming said."
From the downstream application side, the use of UV LED should fully consider the third party (ink, paint, paint, etc.), which is a very uncertain factor compared to white light and RGB.
Most of the UV curing fields operate at high power, generally above kilowatt level. Therefore, the traditional switching power supply is not a wise choice here. It is necessary to re-develop the power supply in combination with the system requirements. Some enterprises have done a lot of good attempts.
Xie Mingxun, deputy general manager of Jingyuan Optoelectronics, also said, “At present, UV-LED products on silicon substrates are in the forefront of the industrial curing field. This potential has great potential in the future, and requires high stability and wavelength accuracy. The price is relatively stable."
In general, the efficiency of UV LEDs will directly affect the popularity of UV LEDs. It will take some time to settle and wait for the market to erupt. Although the UV LED market looks very good, companies should look at their own conditions and see if they can do it well, rather than just follow the trend. The key is to be suitable for themselves to succeed.
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