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LED Driver Reduces Lighting Product Size and Cost
LIGHTimes News Staff
March 9, 2010...Diodes Incorporated has introduced a 1 A rated linear mode constant current LED driver specifically designed to reduce the size and cost of a variety of general illumination products, including flashlights, emergency lighting, garden lighting, and poolside lighting.
The driver is packaged in an optimized small footprint, low profile DFN package. The company boasts that the highly integrated DLD101 LED driver provides designers with significant board space savings, with the package's high thermal efficiency, which enables higher power dissipation than comparable SOT23 ICs.
The DLD101 driver integrates a 'base accessible pre-biased transistor' to incorporate biasing resistors on chip. The company says that this transistor allows the allows the designer to adjust the LED current setting now via a single external resistor, without the need for an additional boost transistor. A high drain current 60V N-channel MOSFET has been used instead of a bipolar transistor for the pass element, to reduce overall bias current.
The company says that in addition to reducing the PCB size and external component count of alternative LED driver solutions, the DLD101 completely removes the EMI signature associated with switching regulator solutions.
The DLD101 1A linear mode constant current LED driver is priced at $0.25 each in quantities of 10K. Company News Release
Veteran-owned Aerospace Company Recognized for Completing $7.7 Million Air Force Contract
LIGHTimes News Staff
March 5, 2010...Patriot Taxiway Industries, of Lomira, Wisconsin USA, recently completed a large scale government contract to supply the U.S. Air Force with 2000 Dual Mode Portable Stand Guard LED lighting systems to 28 Air Force Bases worldwide. The company was featured in Vetrepreneur magazine as an up and coming veteran-owned business. The completion of the contract was even more impressive given that the company currently has merely 15 employees, 11 of which are veterans. Company News Release LIGHTimes SecondPage members login for more. Guests can view membership details.
Newport Digital Technologies Develops LED Digital Signage Solution with WI-FI, 3G and WiMAX Wireless Connectivity
LIGHTimes News Staff
March 5, 2010...Newport Digital Technologies, Inc. reports having launched an LED digital signage solution that offers wireless high definition video and audio streaming that is compatible with 3G networks such as AT&T and Wi-Fi and WiMax networks. According to Newport Digital Technologies (NDT), the LED digital signage solution will provide modular and customizable sizes for displays ranging from 50 inches to stadium-size applications. The company says that the solution will also include a digital content and delivery management system, allowing the end user to remotely manage the digital content for a signage display with a laptop and Web browser application.
“This wireless LED digital signage solution is another significant achievement of NDT’s to bring leading-edge technology through its collaboration with its technology incubator partners, the Institute for Information Industry (III) and the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI),” said NDT CEO Michael Lutton. “This product line reflects the company’s ability to continue to bring leading-edge technology to market in a cost-effective manner and is now available to our AT&T and other channel partners. We anticipate this unique wireless signage solution to generate significant revenue for NDT in calendar years 2010 and 2011."
“The 3G, Wi-Fi and WiMax features will enable this signage solution to have video and audio streaming connectivity anywhere there is 3G, Wi-Fi or WiMax network,” commented Richard Tanimoto, NDT Senior Managing Director. “The customizable display sizes will offer a myriad of solutions that include retail, public, commercial buildings, sporting event venues, where digital content is important and meaningful for business and government applications.”
Company News Release
Honeywell LED Wingtip Lighting Now Standard on Airbus A320 Family Aircraft
LIGHTimes News Staff
March 5, 2010...Honeywell announced today that its LED wingtip navigation lighting is now standard on new production Airbus A320 Family aircraft, comprising the A318, A319, A320 and A321.
Honeywell boasts that its LED wingtip navigation lighting lasts up to 40 times longer than current halogen technology, greatly reducing operator maintenance costs. The company indicated that drop-in LED replacements make maintenance quicker and easier.
"Honeywell's LED lighting solution ensures safety by guaranteeing light output is always bright enough to be compliant with Federal Aviation Regulations (FAR)," said Jeff Johnston, vice president of Platform Components, Honeywell Aerospace. "Our technology accurately determines the life of the light to ensure continued airworthiness instead of letting it dim beyond standards, which allows operators to proactively plan maintenance."
Honeywell offers retrofit LED wingtip lighting for the A320 Family also. It requires no aircraft modification for the lighting installation. This product is part of an overall suite of fourth generation LED aircraft lighting products that the company has provided for commercial and military planes for more than a decade.
Honeywell News Release
RPI Student Finalist in Research Award for Study of Efficiency Droop-Combating LEDs
LIGHTimes News Staff
March 5, 2010...Jiuru Xu, a physics and astronomy student at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, is one of the finalists in the running for the Lemelson-Rensselaer Prize, according to an article in the Troy Record. His research focused on a new type of LED that reduces the little-understood "efficiency droop" that causes LED light bulbs to lose efficiency as they receive higher electrical currents.
The annual Lemelson-Rensselaer Prize is awarded to a Rensselaer senior or graduate student who has applied a technology in a new way, created or improved a product or process, redesigned a system or demonstrated remarkable inventiveness. The prize is funded through a partnership with the Lemelson-MIT program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which has given a similar prize to outstanding student inventors at MIT since 1995.
iSuppli Predicts LED Shortage in 2010
LIGHTimes News Staff
March 2, 2010...iSuppli Corporation warns that the global supply of LEDs is facing a shortage in 2010. The company further warns that the year may end in acute undersupply unless production capacity is increased. The company says that in 2009 consumption of LEDs reached 63 billion units, up from 57 billion in 2008.
iSuppli estimates that the overall LED consumption for 2009 came
"dangerously close" to the industry’s total capacity of 75 billion units. The company says that many LED manufacturers were operating at nearly 100 percent utilization levels.
“It is clear that demand is outstripping supply,” said Jagdish Rebello, senior director and principal analyst for wireless research at iSuppli. “With LED market growth forecasted to rise by double-digit percentages for at least the next three years—including 2010—a drastic undersupply situation could occur this year unless additional capacity is brought online to meet the increased demand.”
LED -backlit LCD TVs are demanding more and more LEDs.
iSuppli points out that unlike notebooks, which typically use 50 LEDs, or monitors, which employ about 100 LEDs, LCD-TVs on average consume anywhere from 300 to 500 LEDs per panel. Additionally, the company notes that LEDs used for backlighting of LCD-TVs demanding a high level of uniformity. Therefore, iSuppli says that the main impact of the shortage will be on LEDs for LCD TV panels. iSuppli News Release
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Barco LED Tiles and Projectors Animate Chinese Spring Festival Backdrop
LIGHTimes News Staff
March 2, 2010...This years Chinese Spring Festival, a gala event is broadcast annually on the eve of Chinese New Year by state-run China Central Television (CCTV), reportedly captured 96 percent of the Chinese television view audience on the mainland. The audience of 700 million-plus viewers worldwide, included large numbers of people watching the show live via the internet.
The CCTV Spring Festival Gala has grown into a genuine cultural phenomenon since its inception in 1982. It runs more than four hours and features a colorful assortment of entertainment, including pop songs, dances, crosstalk, stage comedies and drama, acrobatics and other folk arts.
This year CCTV deployed a high definition LED backdrop as the show's centerpiece. The enormous LED backdrop, measuring 18 x 9 meters, has a physical resolution up to 2952 x 1440 pixels. It utilizes 820 Barco ILite 6BK tiles. Barco contends that it is the largest indoor LED display in China today. The ILite 6 BK is a 6mm black LED display with excellent contrast and modular design that allows displays of nearly any shape and size to be built. Additionally, four Barco FLM HD20, the 20,000 lumens native HD projectors, were deployed on stage. Barco News Release
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Sharp Introduces MiniZeni LED Series with CRI of 87
LIGHTimes News Staff
March 2, 2010...Sharp has introduced a new series of high power LED modules called MiniZeni. It is reportedly the progeny of the company's Zenigata series.
The MiniZeni series reportedly features a CRI value of 87 and a long service life. Sharp says that the LEDs come in compact packages, are extremely flat, economical and bright.
Sharp points out that the 'MiniZeni' LED modules are substantially smaller than the models of the ZENIGATA LED modules measuring 15 x 12 x 1.6 millimetres. However, the company boasts that they only require 56% of the volume of their parent with approximately the same light output. An ceramic plate is also used as the carrier material. They have a light output of up to 410 lumens (depending on the module), a substantially improved CRI value of at least 87 at all colour temperatures , Sharp sets new standards in light technology. The 6.7 W Sharp 'MiniZeni' series has a square LED matrix consisting of a total of 45 LEDs that are arranged in fifteen parallel-switched series of threes. and achieve a luminous flux of 355 to 410 lm, depending on the model.
The matrix of the 3.6 W versions consist of a total of 24 LEDs that are arranged in eight parallel-switched series of three and achieve a luminous flux of up to 230 lm. The color temperatures of the LEDs are from warm white (2700K) to cool white (5000K).
Sharp says that 'High colour rendering' LED modules such as its MiniZeni Series are ideal for applications such as photography, medical technology (e.g. for OP lights), in shop window decoration and also in the presentation of merchandise.
Sharp News Release
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Breaking SSL barriers... and ratting out the fiends
Tom Griffiths - Publisher
March 5, 2010..."Records are made to be broken," quotes the old adage, and it is never more true in vibrant technology areas such as LED lighting. Two of solid state lighting's 'technology barriers' have recently been broken with a recent announcement from Cree of lab results for 200+ lumen-per-watt (lm/w) from a power LED, and from BetaLED with new 100 lm/w exterior soffit luminaires. While barriers may be just a another number, they also have significance to humans because they build belief. In some cases, it's belief that a particular task really can be accomplished. Sir Edmund Hillary succeeded at climbing Mt. Everest, and now about 150 people reach the summit of that mountain each year. In other cases, it demonstrates that a barrier is not a physical one, but a mental one. The four minute mile was deemed by many to be "unbreakable" due to human physiology. "Not enough capacity to absorb oxygen, and it's simply too long a span to maintain that anaerobic condition," was a common argument. Then in May of 1954, Roger Bannister broke the barrier. While that was a huge accomplishment, even more stunning was that it was broken a second time by Bannister's closest competitor, John Landy, just six weeks later. This wasn't a one-off miracle performance. The barrier wasn't a physical barrier, but a psychological one. In classic "did it second" form, Landy took the approach that "it wasn't really a barrier" at all and contended that, “It has nothing to do with psychology," he was quoted as saying. "It was just a matter of having the right runners at the right level of training and the right set of circumstances." Meanwhile the "barrier" had stood and been argued-over for over decades, while human physiology hadn't gotten better. People had simply been training to get as close to the 4 minute mile as possible, but not necessarily to get under it. Once the "barrier" was broken, perceptions changed to "how much below it can we get. Once there were at least two believers", 9 or 10 managed the feat in the next 24 months with the new records continuing to be set 18 more times from 1955 to 2000!)
It wasn't that long ago when some were suggesting that 200 lm/watt would be close to all we could expect out of a power LED source, and I remember charts showing LED efficacy showing a real asymptote kicking in around that 200 lm/w. The DOE's LED lighting roadmap has actually been adjusted at least once to reflect the efficacy growth curve exceeding the time frames that the industry originally expected. When asked for some thoughts on "the barrier", Cree's New Business Development Director, Mark McClear commented that, "By hitting that mark, I think it has been pretty clearly demonstrated that there is still more room to grow. Breaking this 'barrier' clearly establishes LEDs as the most energy-efficient artificial light source." Cree has been very reliable about turning "lab results" into production-available products in a12 to 18-month time frame.
The second recent accomplishment was breaking that 100 lm/w "barrier" at the luminaire level. I suspect that Beta isn't the first to claim the accomplishment, but I do know that they have been one of the consistent performers in the exterior SSL lighting space, and are probably the most visible brand in that segment. And if they said it, that we can expect it is true. While 100 lm/w doesn't suddenly shift the business case in comparison to 96 or 98, it is easy to recognize that "more than 100" is something that the industry can latch onto in order to stake claim to offering the highest efficacy solutions. “Our achievement of reaching over 100 lumens-per-watt delivered in outdoor LED luminaires demonstrates the advantages of LED technology over HID,” said Christopher Ruud, president of BetaLED, a division of Ruud Lighting.
Hopefully what will be memorable here is that the 100 lm/w mark is being achieved
'on the target'. As Ruud explained, “Lumen-per-watt ratings on traditional
lamp sources are misleading because they don’t account for inefficiencies
of the ballast, reflector or lens. Lamp manufacturers have claimed 100 lumens-per-watt
with conventional light sources but this was not a measure of total lumens exiting
the product. While HID technologies reached the 100 lumens-per-watt mark
at the lamp, i.e. bare source, the light output was not directed in a useable
fashion. Up to 40 percent of the bare lamp’s output can be lost to
ballast, reflector and lens inefficiencies. BetaLED integrates LED chip
technology with optical performance and an optimized fixture design to maximize
light output at the source and on target. This delivered, targeted-lumen output
is the most efficacious luminaire to date, and further proof that an LED is
the most efficient light source in the industry."
I think Mark summed it up nicely with a thought on the ultimate relevance, outside
of this or that number. "Raising the performance bar in brightness and
efficacy is really about economics. Each advance in LED performance lowers LED
lighting product costs, opens new markets and applications and brings the LED
Lighting Revolution to more and more people." The performance continues
to march forward regardless, but I believe the fact that these 'barriers' have
been broken will really lock into people's minds that "LED lighting can
do it".
Time to start calling out the violators?
In my marketing life, I have never been one to focus others' attention too much on what the competition is doing, generally preferring to simply "outperform and ignore them" rather than make more direct accusations of their exaggerations or 'specsmanship'. That admittedly colors my thinking to create some distaste on those that might take a different approach. But things have changed, I believe. For the LED lighting market, as LED efficacies come up, new entrants are better able to claim that their luminaire, or their "integral replacement lamp" if it is an LED bulb or LED tube type of design, is a cost effective replacement for an incandescent, fluorescent or HID source. The specs make the case, and while in the past, if a company was claiming 50 lm/w but only putting out 40, it didn't really matter all that much since no rational decision maker was going to choose their solution compared to a fluorescent or HID incumbent except in a few specialized cases. Generally, when you have a specialized case, extra diligence is required and the truth will be uncovered in short order. A bad apple doesn't have to ruin the whole bushel in most of those real-world circumstances.
But as LEDs really do become recognized as the most efficacious source out there, the risk to the industry is increasing. The decision maker sees enough luminaires from reliable suppliers to be putting out 80 lm/w and more, so it starts to sink in that such performance isn't the special case that it once was. As their guard comes down, so does their risk aversion and skepticism. They test a few top notch suppliers, and find those suppliers are meeting the specs they claim. "Looks like the claims are reliable," they say to themselves. Then along comes a supplier whose name has been out there, and who is claiming a spec along the lines of what the decision maker has seen, with the addition that the "new guy" is showing a substantial cost savings. Makes sense... the two progress curves are "increased performance at the same price" and "similar performance at a lower price" especially from lower-overhead and potentially more agile new entrants. Problem is, the manufacture is lying, or using inferior materials, and with the decision maker's guard down, it may not be discovered until hundreds of units are installed (especially if they are replacement lamps). The industry gets a black eye.
So what should be do? Our suggestion is that maybe it's time to reset the industry's "politeness meter" to be oriented towards protecting the customers, and start calling out the blatant violators. At least one resource for that is in the Energy Star realm. Recently, we even let one slip through, as a company that signed up as an Energy Star "partner" projected the story that it was due to its product performance. "Partner" says "we want to support the Energy Star program" not "we have Energy Star qualified products". And Energy Star is pretty clear on its policies. "Partner" can't be used to imply the products are Energy Star approved, whether the mistake is made intentionally or not. There's no fine print about it either. Personally, I think the Energy Star "brand" is well enough established that the use of the phrase "partner" should be scaled back to include only those companies that have at least one product that is actually certified for the mark. They may have other products that aren't there yet, or for which a category doesn't exist, but having at least one would probably take us 90% of the way towards eliminating the problem, both because ignorance would not be an excuse, and because violation of how "partner' is used would put the company at jeopardy of losing their Energy Star approval on a product that they invested effort in getting the mark attached to. We are advocating that violators be reported. If you see what you believe to be the improper use of the Energy Star Partner mark, or see claims of an LED replacement lamp as being "Energy Star qualified" (the specs don't kick in until August), you can and should report them to ssl@energystar.gov.
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