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Veeco Gets Orders For MOCVD Systems from Two Companies
CompoundSemi News Staff
July 19, 2010...Veeco of Plainview, New York USA, reports that Arima Optoelectronics Corporation of Taiwan has ordered multiple MOCVD systems. Veeco also announced that it has received an order from Neo Neon for its MOCVD system.
Specifically Arima ordered several TurboDisc(R) K465i Gallium Nitride (GaN) and E475 Arsenic Phosphide (As/P) Metal Organic Chemical Vapor Deposition (MOCVD) Systems.
Both MOCVD systems for Arima are for high-volume production of high-brightness LEDs. The E475 systems will be used to produce red, orange, and yellow LEDs. All of the LEDs will go towards TV and display backlighting.
Marco Kuo, President of Arima Optoelectronics, said, "Most of the systems will be installed in Shanxi Province, Northern China, where we have entered into an agreement with the local government to form a new joint venture company to manufacture LEDs for backlight applications."
Neo Neon's order is for its first Veeco TurboDisc(R) K465i MOCVD system to support its LED manufacturing capacity ramp at its JiangMen, China factory. Veeco received the order during the recently completed second quarter.
Dr. Jurgen Yeh, Chief Technology Officer, commented, "Neo-Neon plans to expand our LED wafer output seven-fold over the next three years. We have decided to include Veeco's K465i MOCVD system in our plans due to its proven high productivity as well as the recent uniformity and repeatability advances that Veeco has achieved. " To fund its expansion, Neo-Neon has recently raised NT$2.06 billion (U.S. $64 million) through a share issuance in Taiwan.
Philips Lumileds Improves Luxeon Rebel PC Amber Hot/Cold Factor and Light Output
LIGHTimes News Staff
July 16, 2010...Philips Lumileds reports that the Amber version of its Luxeon Rebel phosphor converter (PC) LED now has improved performance. Specifically the amber LED has a 12 percent increased hot/cold factor at 80 degrees C. The hot/cold factor indicates how much light is delivered at operating conditions as opposed to test conditions. Additionally, Philips Lumileds contends that the LED's lumen output and lumens per watt (efficacy) performance exceed that of all other amber power LEDs.
The company points out that amber LEDs have been essential for some time in automotive, construction/manufacturing, and as lighting in the entertainment industry. Now, according to the company, makers of LED-based retrofit bulbs have particular interest in using amber LEDs to help replicate the color change from white to reddish-yellow as the light is dimmed. Despite being used in many applications, conventional amber LEDs have not stood up well to the high temperatures required, and are not bright enough and the color isn't stable enough for many general lighting applications.
The Luxeon Rebel PC Amber LED is actually a blue, thin film flip chip Luxeon Rebel LED used in the company’s white Luxeon LEDs, with the company's proprietary Lumiramic phosphor technology.
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Crystal IS, Inc. Claims Best-Performing Ultraviolet LEDs for Water Disinfection
LIGHTimes News Staff
July 16, 2010...Crystal IS, Inc., a developer of ultraviolet LEDs (UVLEDs) reports that its has demonstrated that its efficient UVLEDs operating at 250nm have the necessary performance to replace mercury-based disinfectant lamps. In recently-published testing results Crystal IS demonstrated for the first time its unique diodes fabricated on a proprietary Aluminum Nitride (AlN) substrate.
“Previous efforts to develop practical LEDs at this wavelength have proven to be very difficult,” said Crystal IS CTO Leo Schowalter. “Most workers in the field have used conventional substrates, such as sapphire as the starting material, and have struggled to produce commercially viable lifetime and power results. Today we are demonstrating that we have overcome many of those issues.”
The company contends that its LEDs operate at the optimal germicidal wavelength. Additionally the company says that their proven efficacy, combined with low power requirements, small size, and longer lifespan, make the diodes ideal for use in water and air sterilization products.
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Labsphere Opens New Manufacturing Facility in China
LIGHTimes News Staff
July 16, 2010...Labsphere, a dominant light metrology company based in North Sutton, New Hampshire USA, has opened a new sales and service facility in Shanghai, China.
The wholly owned foreign enterprise operates under the name Shanghai Lanfei Optical Equipment Co. Ltd. Labsphere says that the new facility is positioned to provide light measurement products and customer support at a local level.
Labsphere opened its first sales office in China in 2007 and has since expanded its team to include applications engineers, manufacturing staff and administrative personnel. The company supplies LED, laser and traditional light source light measurement systems critical to China’s developing solid state lighting industry.
According to Labsphere, the 450-square meter Lanfei facility is equipped with state-of-art spray coating equipment for on-site coating of integrating spheres. Labsphere says that the Lanfei team will also provided off-site coating services for spheres and accessories requiring Labsphere's proprietary near-Lambertian diffuse reflectance coatings. Additionally, Labsphere indicated that the Lanfei sales and application engineers are available for ongoing systems support of all its products, enabling fast service and upgrades to meet evolving LED and solid state lighting market needs.
In addition to providing metrology equipment for the solid state lighting industry, Labsphere, a Halma company, is a leading designer and manufacturer of precision radiometric and photometric test and measurement products addressing the specific needs of the aerospace, electronic imaging, medical imaging, and optics industries. The company reportedly offers a broad line of integrating sphere systems, uniform calibration sources, spectroscopy accessories and diffuse reflectance materials and coatings.
China Video Industry Association Seeks Help in Meeting Demand for LEDs for LCD TV Backlighting
LIGHTimes News Staff
July 14, 2010...The China Video Industry Association (CVIA) arranged its first visit to Taiwan-based LED companies. The CVIA reportedly wants help in meeting LED chip demand for LED-backlit LCD TVs, according to an article in Taipei Times.
The CVIA planned to meet Taiwan's major LED chip packagers and makers such as Epistar Corp.
Deputy director of the association, Bai Weimin said in the article that the association had visited local LED chip packager Everlight Electronics Co yesterday. Members of the association included top Chinese TV makers TCL and Haier.
The article quoted Bai saying, “LED TV will be one of the fast-growing areas in the future as industry experts foresee the trend of using power-saving LED chips to replace CCFL [cold cathode fluorescent lamps] as the backlight source for LCD TV panels.”
Bai added, “We found that the supplies of some LED components from Chinese firms have been unable to catch up with demand because of some technological barriers. And Taiwanese firms are superior in the LED industry.”
Bai also said in the article that she was confident that Chinese TV makers would buy US$5.3 billion worth of LCD panels from AU Optronics Corp, Chimei Innolux Corp, and Chunghwa Picture Tubes Ltd based on the memorandums of understanding signed in January.
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How many lights in an airport?
Tom Griffiths - Publisher
July 13, 2010...Airports have begun making the news recently. Fortunately this time around, it's not for security challenges or full-body scan pictorials, but because they are picking up on the fact that LED lighting is a good idea that can reduce operating expenses and improve the user experience. Some of the more recent wins include Boston, Miami and Pittsburgh, where parking structures have been the first target of opportunity to "see the light".
In
the case of Boston's Logan Airport, with 30 year old lighting ("before"
picture at left) in the Terminal B parking facility, a lighting upgrade revamp
was going to happen either way. Dan Hallahan is the LEED accredited engineer
with engineering firm Fay, Spofford and Thorndike. Dan was responsible
for the overall lighting design, product recommendations and on-site evaluations for
the project, including a pilot installation to compare several different manufacturers LED fixtures. This was their firm's first LED lighting implementation, and they
were pleasantly surprised by the smoothness of the process, and the quality
of the result. "The main considerations included the payback period and efficiency. So prior to selecting the source, we reviewed options to reduce the lighting when it's not necessary. The options include using natural daylight along the parameter of the garage and using occupancy sensors to control the lighting. We designed an occupancy sensor network in the garage to switch large sections of lighting at a time rather than individual lights. If occupancy is detected within 80' of a neighboring section, that triggers the neighboring section to power 'on' allowing drivers ample time to react. With the LED solution, we were able to completely turn off all non-emergency lighting when the lighting isn't needed. We couldn't do that with metal-halide because they require a long warm up period," commented Dan.
The
fact that the Terminal B facility needed the update was key to solid state lighting
being able to take the win ("after" picture at left). Essentially,
Massport was able to consider the acquisition-cost uplift as a delta, compared
to the energy savings that would result. The payback was less than 5 years,
which Hallahan considered "a slam dunk" in terms of acceptable business
cases. Makes sense, considering the last installation had a 30 year life span,
so they didn't need to see 1-2 years to visualize the advantage. With about
8800 hours in a year, 5 years represents about 44000 hours, which would be well
within the product lifetime, given the dimming strategy that the design employs.
Interestingly, when I asked about the other main parking structure at Logan, while there could be an energy saving opportunity, the lighting installed there was "only" 10 years old, is running pretty efficiently, and wasn't likely to be replaced anytime soon. Make no mistake in assuming the incumbents are going to be easily knocked aside. LED lighting can bring a lot to the table, but it faces more than just simply economic decision criteria.. Even when the payback might be clear, whether it is 2, 5 or 10 years, a lighting retrofit is a big task, takes a lot of resources, and is a distraction to the day-to-day business that goes on in a facility. Plus it takes money. Lots of it, and whether it is accomplished with good quality metal halide fixtures (at $300+ a crack) or LED luminaires (not bad, but still more than that), it's not complicated math to figure out that anything over a few thousand fixtures makes it over a million dollar deal. That's not money that's spent lightly, and if it's not handy, it won't be spent at all, regardless of the payback. Municipalities and port authorities are running on tight budgets, and if the capital appropriations aren't there, they have to pursue a nontrivial approval process which may include submitting a bond issue to the voters. But if you need to replace the installation anyway, the delta in those capital budgets becomes substantially lower, and the door opens much wider to the LED lighting alternatives.
Why are we seeing this high-profile upswing? In a word, it's belief, according to BetaLED East Coast Regional Sales Manager, Michael Winegard. Michael oversaw the Terminal B win in Boston, and has reportedly just gotten the nod to equip Logan's new economy parking structure as well as an existing parking structure at Portland Maine's airport. He tells us it's a very different world from two years ago. As the ground was being plowed "back then", it really was a process of enticing the potential users to simply open their minds to the possibility that these new LED lights could be a good idea. While the semiconductor industry had its own track record, LEDs were generally considered to simply not be ready to produce the amount, quality and reliability of light that the incumbents had been delivering for decades. But the industry did well to promote installations and learn from their missteps, and a positive track record began to emerge. "Now, the industry has high profile installations and large scale wins that it can point to, including the I-35 bridge in Minnesota, the city of Anchorage, Alaska and very notably, the City of Los Angeles that is moving ahead with its wide-scale streetlight retrofit plans. Municipalities and facility managers are willing to listen to the full business case simply because there is enough success that indicates the technology works and can be relied on."
So progress continues and airports are on the radar scope. With 3000 or so publicly operated airports, as we move from the parking structures to the ramps, taxiways, runways and eventually on inside the buildings, there is still a bit of room in the opportunity...
Don't miss the 2010-2011 SSL Summit Series, kicking off in New York City, September 14-15. One of this year's highlighted speakers is Margaret Newman, Chief of Staff for the NYC Department of Transportation. Margaret, who is also quite influential in New York City's overall lighting initiatives, will be able to share the methodology and status of their outdoor LED lighting retrofit programs. Installations include the US DOE cooperative evaluation program on the FDR Expressway, as well as some walking path and sidewalk installations around the city. How big is the NYC opportunity? Only a 10 states have a larger population then New York City does on it's own, so it would seem worthwhile to find out the details... www.SSLsummit.com
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