No matter the global economy booming of 2009 is not clear so far, the “green energy” is still the most concerned topic that does not fade away. The LED is like the crown jewel of the the green industry. It has top performace and has been evaluated for best future development potential. Topology Research Institute (TRI) researcher Harrison Po says that the price cutting war of white LED between Taiwan and Japan manufacturers makes the price falls 15~25%. Besides, the LED backlight module’s penetration into NB and Netbook flies high and big scale of application on LED ilumination and out-door advertising lead by China market. Therefore, it is predicted that the above reasons will stimulate the global growth scale at 15.7% and make highest record of 8.677 billion US dollars. Meanwhile, Taiwan LED production value will be 2.314 billion USD, and the growth rate 18.24% performs top over the world. Facing the challenge from China manufacturers, group operation and strategy alliance will be the key to stable the market positioning for Taiwan makers.

LED price drops, backlight module benefits

Having the advantage of high light emitting effiency and high illumination, the white LED is an index for LED entering the lighting market. Besides, the application becomes broader gradually. Mr. Po points out that due to affected by the price cutting strategy of Japan company Nichia and the supply over demand of whole market in 2008, the white LED ASP is estimated to drop from USD 0.16 in 2008 to USD 0.14 in 2009. Although the white LED price is predicted to drop 15~25%, but the ASP drop will help increase the demand of market and release the pressure of suply-over-demand.

TRI analyzes the application trend of LED in 2009 and thinks the price fall and the break through of backlight module technology will push the LED backlight module market penetration rate increases continuously. For example, Acer and Dell announce that they will adapt the LED backlight module broadly in 2009. The peneration rate for NB will leap from 10% in 2008 to 28% in 2009; meanwhile, the penerate rate for netbook has reached 100%. Though the biggest backlight module size has reached 46” for LCD TV, but there exists bottle neck technically. It is not possible to be mass produced in short term. More over, affected by the mobile phone shipping quantity is lower than expected and China white brand mobile phone growth is under observation, the market value of mobile phone LED backlight module may decrease slowly.

Outdoor advertising and illumation as two market bright spots

On the other hand, the indication of brand new LED application by 2008 Beijing Olymic games continues to spread out. In addition, the 2010 Shanghai world expo, Guangzhou Asian Games, and 2011 SengZeng World University Games will begin successively. The application market opportunity of big outdoor LED monitor and business lanscape illumination will also be worth of the gaze of LED industry in 2009. Mentioning about the LED street lighting market. Altogether with the push by the international exhibitions and games, large procurement of governments internationally, the execution of the demonstration plan of LED road lighting, and the pass of LED road lighting regulations continuously, TRI estimates LED street lighting market peneration rate will break 1% and enter the fast growth period.

Talking about the application of indoor illumination of LED, Mr. Po thinks that the efficiency of LED bulb may be up to 100 lm/W. But the price must slip further to make the indoor lighting market popluar faster. The AC LED driven by AC technology and LED illumination regulations and standards made by each country will help the developmemt of the LED lighting industry.

Taiwan makers look for new strategy to stable the market position

Benefiting from the increase of LED NB and Netbook shipping, and lead by market application like Shanghai Expo, Asian Games, street lighting, projector light source, mobile phone and digital frame, Taiwan LED makers are predicted to receive a lot of orders in outdoor advertizing and illumination products in year 2009. But because the problem of suply over demand, Taiwan makers will solve it by reducing the production lines expansion. The supply of Taiwan makers will fall from 52% in 2008 to 28% in 2009 predictedly.

Altough Taiwan makers confronts Chinese LED makers threats, and the market is limited due to technology or patent issues. Mr. Po thinks they can stablize the market share through the strategic alliance, or by deploying a group type development from top to down stream completely like UMC, Foxconn, Liteon, which will help lower the production cost.