Category Archives: LED Packaging and Testing

Seoul Semiconductor, a global LED manufacturer, announced the availability of Acrich MJT 3030 a new LED in the Acrich MJT product family which improves on performance and enables lower system costs. Using Seoul Semiconductor’s Acrich MJT technology, the MJT 3030 LED offers improved performance and high lm/$ in a mid-power package.

This new Acrich series has dimensions of 3.0mm x 3.0mm delivering a typical luminous flux of 103 lumens at 40mA at 22V, 25° C, 3000K and can be driven to a maximum current of 60mA delivering upto 155 lumens to address high-lumen applications that require low cost and high reliability solutions. To improve time-to-market, lighting manufacturers seeking ENERGY STAR qualification can take advantage of the completed 6,000 hours LM-80 data of the Acrich MJT 3030 LED.

Utilizing Seoul Semiconductor’s proven and reliable high voltage architecture, Acrich MJT “Multi-Junction chip Technology”, the Acrich LED eliminates the tradeoff between size and efficacy. The Acrich MJT 3030 can be operated in either AC or DC modes, depending on your configuration. AC mode, which uses the Acrich IC instead of an AC/DC converter, improves reliability and simplifies integration when making lighting fixtures. The 0.97 power factor and low THD of Acrich IC-based modules helps save energy and optimize designs. In the DC-mode, the low-current operation of the Acrich MJT 3030 can lower the number of components and reduce the cost of the power supply. The inherent flexibility of the Acrich MJT 3030 LED enables optimized performance in both AC and DC configurations.

Seoul Semiconductor Executive Vice President of Lighting sales, Jay Kim stated that, “The new Acrich MJT 3030 LED combines the improved performance and high lm/$ with the reliability of the MJT technology enabling lighting manufacturers to create new innovative solutions to address a wide range of lighting applications.”

Last month, Yole Développement  announced the update of its technology and market analysis, LED Packaging Technology & Market Trends. Under this new report, the research market and strategy consulting company highlights the impact of advanced packaging technologies in the LED industry.

“The combination of cost reduction and advanced packaging technologies such as Flip Chip and Chip Scale Package, is changing the LED industry landscape, especially its supply chain,” Yole announced.  For example, introduction of Chip Scale Package solution clearly reduces the number of manufacturing steps: today, some LED chip manufacturers, with Chip Scale Package technology already supply their products to the LED module makers directly.

LED packaging

Flip Chip technology has step by step attracted attention from the lighting, backlighting and flash markets, becoming one the most important developing items this year. Following the LED TV crisis and with the entry of Chinese players, positioning has been reshuffled in the LED industry. The product quality of Chinese LED manufacturers has increased to a level where they are now real competitors for all players. In such a highly competitive environment, three major challenges lie ahead for the LED industry regarding the General Lighting market: efficacy improvement, cost decrease and color consistency increase.

To answer these challenges, several players have now turned to Flip Chip (FC) LED, as these components present several advantages over traditional horizontal (MESA) and vertical LEDs: they are wire-bonding free, can be driven at higher current, and have a smaller size package (…).

And although the FC LED technology has been launched for quite a long time by Lumileds, it was restricted from “popularization” due to technical / technological barriers (low yield regarding bumping / eutectic process…). Additionally, the financial investment required for packaging equipment, represented a strong barrier in an industry that was still recovering.

At middle and long term, this technology [CSP] could make chip manufacturers supply directly to module manufacturers.

But the technology has gradually attracted attention from the lighting, backlighting and flash markets, becoming one the most important developing items this year.

“Whereas Flip Chip LED represented only 11 percent of overall high power LED packaging in 2013, we expect this component to represent 34 percent by 2020. Flip Chip LED will take market share from vertical LED that will represent 27 percent of overall high power LED packages by 2020,” said Pars Mukish, Senior Market & Technology Analyst, LED, Lighting Technologies, Compound Semiconductors and OLEDs.

In addition to offering an increased “performance / cost” ratio, Flip Chip LEDs are also a key enabling technology for the development of Chip Scale Package (CSP) that could allow for further cost reduction.

CSPs are novel to the LED industry but they are the mainstay of the semiconductor industry. Development of CSPs in the Silicon ICs was driven by miniaturization, improved thermal management, higher reliability, and simply the need to connect to an ever increasing pin-count on an ever shrinking die. Chip Scale packages also enabled a reduction in device parasitic and allowed for ease of integration into Level 2 packaging (e.g.: module packaging for LED). It is therefore a natural evolution for this packaging innovation to proliferate into other industries (such as the LED industry).
Basically, a CSP represents a single chip direct mountable package that is the same size as the chip. Regarding LED devices, CSPs are made of a blue FC LED die on which a phosphor layer is coated (the main application of such package being General Lighting). CSP presents several advantages such as: miniaturized size, better thermal contact to substrate. However, eliminating several process steps of traditional LED packaging, CSPs are also having an impact on the industry structure with some LED chip manufacturers supplying their products directly to LED module manufacturers. At middle and long term, this technology could make chip manufacturers supply directly to module manufacturers.

Soraa, a developer of GaN on GaN LED technology, announced today that one of its founders, Dr. Shuji Nakamura, has been awarded the 2014 Nobel Prize in Physics. Recognizing that Nakamura’s invention, the blue light emitting diode (LED), represents a critical advancement in LED lighting, the Nobel committee explained the innovation “has enabled bright and energy-saving white light sources.”

“I am very honored to receive the Nobel Prize from The Royal Swedish Academy of Science for my invention of the blue LED,” said Nakamura. “It is very satisfying to see that my dream of LED lighting has become a reality. I hope that energy-efficient LED light bulbs will help reduce energy use and lower the cost of lighting worldwide, and that is why we founded Soraa.”

Shuji Nakamura - SoraaIn 2007, Dr. Shuji Nakamura, along with pioneering professors Dr. Steven DenBaars and Dr. James Speck, came together and made a bet on an LED technology platform completely different than current industry practice, a technology most industry experts at the time considered to be impossible to execute.

“We knew that our GaN on GaN LED technology would be the future of lighting and Soraa has made this a reality,” added Nakamura.

Soraa bet that GaN on GaN LEDs would produce more light per area of LED and be more cost-effective than technology based on other foreign substrates like sapphire or silicon carbide. This strategy ran against every trend in the LED industry. That bet paid off: today, Soraa’s LEDs emit more light per LED material than any other LED; handle more electric current per area than any other LED; and its GaN on GaN crystals are up to a thousand times purer than any other LED crystal.

“Shuji is simply brilliant and well deserving of this honor. Largely as a result of his work, Soraa has been able to push the boundaries of what is possible in high performance LED lighting,” said Jeff Parker, CEO of Soraa. “Soraa’s GaN on GaN LED lamps are now regarded as the best in the world, with quality of light that far surpasses any other LED product.”

Pixelligent Technologies announced today that it has been selected for a Department of Energy (DOE) solid-state-lighting award to support the continued development of its OLED lighting application. The details of the award can be viewed on the DOE SSL website. Pixelligent and its partner OLEDWorks were selected as one of only nine awardees nationwide for this $1.25 million DOE award.

“This is the second OLED lighting award we have received from the DOE in partnership with OLEDWorks, which clearly demonstrates our leadership position in developing the next generation materials required to accelerate the commercialization of OLED lighting,” said Craig Bandes, President & CEO of Pixelligent Technologies.  “We are proud to have been selected by the DOE for this highly competitive grant that, when combined with our internal investments, will provide the resources required to optimize our OLED lighting application,” said Gregory Cooper PhD, Founder & CTO of Pixelligent Technologies.

The goal of this project is to develop a novel internal light extraction design that improves the light extraction efficiency of OLED lighting devices by more than 200%, without negatively impacting the device voltage, efficacy, or angular color dependence.

“This federal grant reflects the type of common sense investments we should be making to help our economy rebound by boosting U.S. manufacturing and high-tech innovation,” said Congressman Ruppersberger of Maryland’s Second District. “The fact that one of Baltimore’s own companies was selected and will be bringing jobs back to the city is icing on the cake. Pixelligent is an impressive and growing company, and I am proud that they have chosen the Second District to call home.”

In the LED packaging world, a wind of change is blowing. A LED TV crisis, and new Chinese players have totally modified the LED industry and its supply chain. Under this context, with a high competitive environment, new challenges have been identified by Yole Développement (Yole) analysts: efficacy improvement, cost decrease. To answer to the LED market needs, companies have today to innovate their technologies and implement new solutions like Flip Chip for LED packaging.

highpowerled_breakdown_yole_sept.2014

“In 2013, LED based on Flip Chip technology represented 11 percent (in volume) of the overall high power LED market; such market share should reach 24 percent (in volume as well) by 2020”, explains Pars Mukish, Senior Market and Technology Analyst, LED, OLED & Compound Semiconductors, at Yole (Source: LED Packaging 2014 report, to be released end of September 2014).

At the end of September, the 4th International LED professional Symposium +Expo (LpS 2014) will take place for the second time. Located in Bregenz, Austria and targeting industrials and researchers involved in LED design and engineering, the symposium is a three-day event including conferences, workshops, networking and exhibition.

At LpS 2014, Yole will present its latest analysis, with a special focus on LED chip manufacturing and packaging. During his presentation, Pars Mukish from Yole, will highlight the recent developments dedicated to LED chip manufacturing and packaging. Yole’s analyst will detail main market trends, emerging technologies and technical challenges including packaging process steps and supply chain.

All these results are part of two technology & market reports, LED Front-End Manufacturing Trends (released in May 2014) and LED Packaging that will be released end of September 2014.

“At Yole, we are daily working with the key players of the LED industry, to understand and analyze recent developments on manufacturing process and packaging solutions. Our objective is to evaluate the impact of the LED penetration rate in the solid state lighting market,” explains Pars Mukish.

LpS 2014 is a 60-lecture program and welcomes 1,300 visitors.

Soraa, a developer of GaN on GaN LED technology, announced today new psychophysical research proving that whiteness and color rendering have a strong effect on the perception of energy-efficient LED lighting. The study was approved by an Institutional Review Board and led by Kevin Houser at Penn State University.

Compared with conventional blue-based LEDs, study participants overwhelmingly preferred the whiteness and color rendering of Soraa’s full visible spectrum lamps with Violet-Emission 3-Phosphor (VP3) technology. Like conventional electric light sources such as incandescent and halogen lamps, Soraa’s lamps emit full visible spectrum light which renders warm, saturated colors—including important colors like reds and bright greens. Furthermore, these lamps excite Optical Brightening Agents (OBAs) in white objects like clothing, paper and plastics, making them look intentionally whiter. However, in their race to create maximally efficient, cheap products, most LED manufacturers skipped parts of the spectrum. This has resulted in blue-LED based lighting products that cannot truly render whiteness or colors.

Uniquely, Soraa’s full visible spectrum lamps with VP3 Natural White are engineered to emit all colors of the rainbow, including violet, which excites OBAs and perfectly renders whites. The research study at Penn State showed that the vast majority of participants preferred objects rendered under Soraa’s full visible spectrum light over standard LED light that lacked the short wavelength range of the spectrum. In fact, whether looking at a white dress shirt or their own smile, 90% of users preferred the whiteness rendering provided by Soraa’s lamps.

As for colors, study participants commented that colors were more saturated, vibrant and attractive under Soraa’s full visible spectrum LED lamps with VP3 Vivid Color (color rendering index (CRI) of 95 and R9 of 95) versus the blue-based LED lamps with a standard CRI of 85 and R9 of 0. The research showed that the company’s VP3 technology rendered colors with high fidelity and no change in saturation; and the colors accurately matched the reference halogen lamp. This was true not only for colored objects, but also for participants’ skin complexions.

“There are those who’ve asked: does color and whiteness rendering really matter?  Well, it does, and we now have the data to prove it,” said Mike Krames, CTO of Soraa. “Because all of our lamps render the entire visible spectrum, white fabrics and paper goods pop, plastics are brilliant and people’s smiles are whiter, and colors are more natural and beautiful.  That’s good news for consumers and retailers, who want and deserve the enormous economic and environmental benefits of LED lighting, but are unwilling to sacrifice the sales benefits of excellent light quality in return.”

Kateeva  announced that it has closed its Series D round with $38 million in financing. The newest participant is Samsung Venture Investment Corporation (SVIC). Existing investors also contributed. They include: Sigma Partners, Spark Capital, Madrone Capital Partners, DBL Investors, New Science Ventures, and VEECO Instruments, Inc.

The company has raised more than $110 million since it was founded in 2008.

Kateeva makes the YIELDjet™ platform — a precision deposition platform that leverages inkjet printing to mass produce flexible and large-size OLED panels. The new funds will be used to support the company’s manufacturing strategy and expand its global sales and support infrastructure. Production systems are currently being built at the company’s facility in Menlo Park, Calif. to fulfill early orders.

The funding news coincides with the 2014 OLEDs World Summit taking place this week in Berkeley, Calif.

“Kateeva is a technology leader and has built a significant business in the OLED space,” said Michael Pachos, Senior Investment Manager at SVIC. “The company has demonstrated both a technical and business vision in driving adoption of OLED displays and lighting, and we look forward to contributing to its progress.”

“We believe that OLEDs on flexible substrates play a major role in the insatiable quest for ultra-durable, high-performance, and unbreakable mobile displays, and Kateeva has proven to hold the keys to a critical industry problem,” said Fahri Diner, Managing Director of Sigma Partners and a member of the Board of Directors of Kateeva. “Moreover, we are very excited about Kateeva’s impressive innovations that are poised to make large-panel OLED televisions finally an affordable reality — perhaps the Holy Grail of the display world. In partnership with SVIC, we’re delighted to offer continued support to Kateeva as they rapidly scale operations to support accelerating demand for OLED manufacturing solutions,” Diner continued.

Kateeva Chief Executive Officer Alain Harrus said: “SVIC’s investment speaks volumes about our technology’s enabling value to world-class OLED producers. It will reinforce our leading position and help serve all our customers better. Also, we appreciate our existing investors for their enduring commitment and trusted guidance. Thanks to their confidence in our technology and execution, mass producing OLEDs will be much smoother for leading display manufacturers.”

CEA-Leti and LUCIOM, which develops visible-light communication using light-emitting diodes (LEDs), have launched a project to develop high-data-rate LiFi transceivers. With this technology, LUCIOM expects to offer in mid-2015 one of the first high-data-rate bidirectional light-fidelity, or LiFi, products that can work with different LED lighting sources, and on mobile devices.

Visible light communications (VLC) has gained significant momentum in recent years, primarily because of expectations that LEDs will become predominant in the lighting market. As LiFi benefits from this rapid market penetration of LED lighting sources and their reduced cost, it will become more efficient and economical compared to wireless RF communications.

Moreover, because LEDs can be modulated at very high frequencies and their oscillations are invisible to humans, they permit information transmission at very high data rates.

Earlier this year, Leti demonstrated a new prototype for wireless high-data-rate Li-Fi transmission. The technology employs the high-frequency modulation capabilities of LED engines used in commercial lighting. It achieves throughputs of up to 10Mb/s at a range of three meters, suitable for HD video streaming or Internet browsing, using light power of less than 1,000 lumens and with direct or even indirect lighting. This technology will be adapted to meet the needs of LUCIOM’s transceivers.

LUCIOM’s technology allows the convergence of light-emitting diodes with the worldwide proliferation of mobile devices to make any LED lighting source a high-speed data transmitter that is both secure and environmentally friendly.

Based on integrated circuits and transceivers, the technology turns LED light sources into positioning beacons, which transmit signals. This allows smartphones and tablets to become LiFi enabled, thanks to a receiver that is implemented in a 3.5mm audio jack dongle. The compact size of the receiver eases the integration in the device. In addition, the audio remains accessible from the audio interface, even when the LiFi application is launched from a smartphone.

LUCIOM’s technology can be combined with the use of gyro-sensors present in smartphones and tablets to predict movement between two beacons and provide a very accurate position to the user. This way, communication between phones and smart indoor LED lighting can be used inside buildings when GPS technology is no longer effective. The localization application can also be used to provide additional personalized services or information to customers as well as information to the infrastructure manager.

In addition to these indoor-positioning applications, the company is targeting high-data-rate video transfer.The project between Leti and LUCIOM builds on their previous collaboration in which Leti developed an optical over-the-air data link for the company that allows the transmission of true HD video from a lamp to a handheld receiver.

“Our indoor geo-localization could guide shoppers through the maze of large shopping malls to the stores they are seeking, and LED lighting in museums could be used to guide visitors through an enriched tour of the displays and exhibits,” said Michel Germe, CEO of LUCIOM. “Working again with Leti, we will be able to bring new, bidirectional transceivers that enable these applications to market in 2015.”

“LUCIOM was one of the first companies to see that LEDs and LiFi can offer a powerful, secure and highly energy-efficient communications alternative to WiFi,” said Leti CEO Laurent Malier. “With Leti’s first proof of concept developed earlier this year and its expertise in RF communications, we expect data-transmission rates in excess of 100Mb/s with traditional lighting based on LED lamps.”

Intematix Corporation, a manufacturer of phosphor solutions for LED lighting, has collaborated with SABIC’s Innovative Plastics business to create the ChromaLit Linear – a LED offering developed for the lighting industry.  By using Intematix’s remote phosphor technology and SABIC’s LEXAN LUX resins, lighting customers can now achieve the energy efficiency and reliability benefits of LEDs, while also experiencing increased optical efficiency and better light uniformity-a critical factor for commercial environments.

“SABIC is excited to have worked with Intematix to design a solution that successfully addresses a historic challenge with LED lighting used in commercial applications. In addition to being more efficient, the new LED system can be both extruded and injection molded,”  said Venugopal Koka, Director of Electrical Industrial and Lighting Marketing for SABIC’s Innovative Plastics business.

Remote phosphor is a lighting system technology that uses a phosphor component separated from the blue LED energy source. The independent phosphor emits light when excited by blue light. When the phosphor has been separated from the energy source it results in better lighting uniformity and consistency. Intematix selected SABIC’s LEXAN LUX transparent, diffusion and reflective grades for their ChromaLit Linear remote phosphor offering for their superior efficiency and flexible processing capabilities. In addition, the LEXAN LUX base material provides a UL94 flame rating of V0.

Linear light sources are in widespread use for illuminating commercial and industrial applications worldwide. Office lighting and other commercial applications have been challenging for white LEDs because of the need to diffuse the point sources, reducing system efficacy.  The ChromaLit Linear product delivers naturally uniform, high-quality light with conversion efficacy of up to 215 lumens per radiant watt or up to 163 lumens per system watt when used with the most efficient blue LEDs available.

“We expect a whole new set of valuable remote phosphor solutions to emerge as we draw upon SABIC’s world-class expertise in advanced thermoplastics,” said Mark Swoboda, Chief Executive Officer for Intematix. “Our experience has demonstrated that bringing our two companies’ innovations together results in ground-breaking products that accelerate market adoption of LED-based lighting systems.”

Following Intematix’s successful commercialization of the ChromaLit Linear, SABIC’s Innovative Plastics business and Intematix will continue to collaborate on new technology developments to help enable lighting OEMs to take advantage of expanded remote phosphor solutions for solid-state lighting (SSL). The continued collaboration will allow Intematix and SABIC to further combine their complementary expertise driving the development of new applications, technologies and materials which can hasten and optimize the commercialization of new LED products, platforms and lighting applications.

Cree, Inc. has announced that its C2M, 1200V, 80mOhm SiC MOSFETs have been selected by Sanix Corporation, Japan, to be designed into their new 9.9kW three-phase solar inverters for use in the construction of commercial photovoltaic systems in the fast-growing Japanese solar energy market.

“Through this partnership with Cree and their SiC technology, Sanix is able to capture more market share in the competitive Japan solar market,” said Hiroshi Soga, general manager, Sanix Incorporated. “Cree’s silicon carbide MOSFETs were critical for Sanix to meet our efficiency and thermal design targets. SiC switches reduced losses in our inverter electronics by more than 30 percent versus the silicon super-junction MOSFETs we were considering. In addition to providing a large efficiency gain, Cree’s latest generation C2M SiC MOSFETs were priced competitively, making it possible to replace lower voltage, less rugged, and less efficient silicon MOSFETs.”

Utilized in the primary power conversion stage of the solar inverter, Cree’s 1200V C2M0080120D MOSFETs feature faster switching characteristics and up to one-third the switching losses of comparably-rated 900V silicon super-junction MOSFETs. By significantly reducing switching losses, Cree’s SiC MOSFETs enable lower total system energy losses, higher frequency switching, and cooler operating temperatures. These benefits improve conversion efficiency and reduce the system’s size, weight, complexity, and thermal management requirements. At the system level, performance is improved, cost is decreased, and lifetime of the inverter is extended.

“Cree is extremely pleased that Sanix has chosen to specify our C2M, 1200V SiC MOSFET technology in its new 9.9kW solar inverters. Cree SiC power devices can provide significant advantages with regard to PV inverter efficiency, reliability, and cost, and will provide Sanix with a critical competitive advantage as they continue to expand their share of the Japanese solar market,” said Cengiz Balkas, general manager and vice president, Cree Power and RF.

Demonstrated to achieve up to three times the power density of typical silicon technology, Cree’s C2M family of SiC MOSFETs are available in 1200V and 1700V, ranging from 1Ω to 25 mΩ. C2M MOSFETs have been designed into a range of industrial power applications since their March 2013 market introduction and continue to experience increasing demand. Cree is currently delivering production volumes of SiC MOSFETs to Sanix and other PV inverter manufacturers, as well as to makers of industrial power supplies, auxiliary power converters, battery chargers, and motor drives.