Lumileds' new devices have been designed to boost the flash function of camera-enabled cell phones, while Toyoda Gosei says that its white LEDs are twice the brightness of existing technology.

People taking photographs in dark surroundings with camera-enabled cell phones are set to benefit from two new LEDs from Lumileds.

The California-based LED manufacturer has just released Luxeon devices that have been specifically designed for the flash function of such phones.

Lumileds says that its LEDs will enhance the brightness of a typical flash on a camera phone by a factor of 12.

The surface-mounted Luxeon Flash LXCL-PWF1 LED has an output of 40 lm at 1 A drive current, while the LXCL-PWF2 delivers double this luminous flux.

Camera phones featuring the Lumileds technology ought to come in particularly useful for taking pictures at a range of 1-2 meters in the dark.

The latest camera phones feature high-resolution light detectors with many more pixels than previous designs. These require a higher light intensity than previous generations of phones to produce a good image and consequently a brighter flash.

Luxeon says that major handset manufacturers across Europe, the US and Asia will roll out phones featuring the Luxeon device for the 2004 holiday season, traditionally the period in which the most handsets are sold.

Meanwhile, Toyoda Gosei says that it has produced a white LED with unprecedented brightness for backlighting of cell phone handset screens.

The device features a blue LED and a yellow phosphor, producing a brightness of 1300 mcd with a 20 mA drive current.

Packaged in a heat-resistant resin, the LED is said to have a lifetime 50% longer than similar devices.

Toyoda Gosei will begin mass production of the devices after first sampling to customers in March 2005.

Nichia 'to mass produce blue lasers' next year
7 October 2004

The pioneer of GaN-based lasers is reported to be investing around $45 million in a bid to ramp production capacity.

Nichia will begin mass production of GaN-based blue lasers in early 2005, reports Nihon Keizai Shimbun.

The company is believed to be investing more than ￥5 billion ($45 million) at its head office in Anan, Tokushima Prefecture, as it looks to ramp monthly production capacity to around 250,000 units by the end of next year.

Nichia was the first company to develop a blue laser diode and has already invested a similar sum of cash at its Anan plant. The additional investment comes as rival chip manufacturing companies Matsushita, Toshiba and NEC look to ramp up their own blue laser production.

The race to bring next-generation DVD players and recorders to market has stepped up a gear in recent weeks as key hardware manufacturers look to finalize format specifications and sign up Hollywood studios to their respective technology camps.

Sony recently said that it would begin sampling key components for its Blu-ray Disc format, while Toshiba and its allies in the high-definition DVD group have set up an industry group to promote the alternative format it and NEC have developed.

Sample shipments of blue lasers from Nichia are expected to begin next month, with the price of a blue laser for next-generation DVD recording thought to be in the region of $270, according to the report.

In its fiscal year 2006, Nichia is expecting to generate around ￥5 billion from sales of blue laser diodes.

?According to another report from Nihon Keizai Shimbun, Sony and Matsushita plan to incorporate Blu-ray technology in new camcorders that the companies plan to release in 2005.

Using 8 cm discs, as opposed to the conventional 12 cm format for DVD, the camcorders will enable home video recordings in high-definition format.

The smaller discs will have a capacity of 15 GB, compared with 27 GB for the "standard" single-layer Blu-ray format.

Tokushima UV LED Entrepreneur "Taking It To The Bank"
Founding Editor, Jo Ann McDonald
October 11, 2004...There's a popular USA colloquialism: "taking it to the bank" (meaning you can "bet" on or "count" on whatever "it" is) that takes on a literal as well as figurative meaning when you see what an entrepreneur named Yoshihiko Muramoto is doing with UV LEDs. Mr. Muramoto's company is called Nitride Semiconductors Co. Ltd. (which we'll call "NSC" given the words "nitride semiconductors" is so generic in our industry). NSC is located in Japan's Tokushima Prefecture, which is the same home prefecture where Nichia is located. And even more of a coincidence is that Mr. Muramoto has strong ties to Tokushima University, which is the same university Shuji Nakamura attended. Mr. Muramoto's company has two primary product lines. It sells two inch GaN on sapphire wafers, and UV-LEDs. After an initial flurry of excitement when the company was originally formed in April of 2000, due primarily to zest and enthusiasm of its founder and proximity to Nichia, NSC was rather quiet until this summer when it scored a major contract in the banking industry to mass-produce sensors for use in machines that reveal whether a bank note is the real thing... or counterfeit. LIGHTimes second page members can access more on NSC's UV-LED application and patent information...

What's New at Nichia?
LIGHTimes Staff
October 11, 2004...Nichia Corporation of Japan is gearing up for mass production of their blue laser diodes, and they've launched what they're calling their Genuine Ultraviolet LED. News of their LD ramp was publicized recently over Nikkei Net. (Nichia Gearing Up For Mass Blue Laser Production subscription required). According to the Nihon Keizai Shimbun last Thursday edition, Nichia will begin their mass production next Spring and that they'll invest more than 5 billion yen in the company's head office plant in Anan, in Japan's Tokushima Prefecture, over and above the current 5 billion yen it has already invested. Projected capacity will be 200,000 to 300,000 units by the end of 2005 and projected revenues are 5 billion yen from blue spectrum LDs in FY-06. According to the article, Nichia is ramping LD production to take an early lead over all potential competitors, specifically naming Toshiba and Matsushita Electric, but in reality, any and all companies involved in either the Blu-ray Disc Consortium (BDC) and what is now called "the HD-DVD Promotion Group" could well get in on the act, whether through licensing arrangements, or homegrown blue LDs. The latest news out of either standards camp is that camcorders are the next application. In a recent NewsFactor article titled Blu-Ray Backers To Release Camcorders, Sony, Matsushita Electric and Sharp said they plan to release BRD standard-compliant camcorders by early next year. As to Nichia's new high power UV-LEDs, LIGHTimes second page members can access details on ...

Cree's ATP and NETL Awards Will Help Accelerate SSL Development
October 11, 2004...Cree Inc., of Durham, North Carolina USA has recently scored two USA government awards that add up to a total of $4.2 million. One was the through the Advanced Technology Program (ATP) which is administered by NIST, the USA Department of Commerce's (DoC) National Institute of Standards and Technology and the other was through the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL), on behalf of the USA's Department of Energy's (DoE) Office of Building Technologies. Both are for solid-state lighting research and development and both are aimed at reducing cost and energy consumption for general lighting through the use of blue spectrum LED based light emitters, a prime focus at Cree with their GaN on SiC die. Both programs are still subject to negotiation and execution of contract terms and conditions. The ATP project goals include the ability to quadruple the brightness and double the efficiency of existing LED systems, and reduce the cost per lumen using a white LED lamp. The project will span three years and will be conducted with partner Nanocrystal Lighting Corporation. The NETL project is geared to provide a viable replacement for the energy inefficient incandescent light and will also span three years, targeting the development of an array of small-area LEDs with integrated optics, thermal management and electrical power handling circuitry. Company news release

TIR Scores Another $1.4 Million in Orders and CEO Nominated Entrepreneur of the Year
October 11, 2004...TIR Systems Ltd. of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada has proudly made two announcements. The company has received orders totaling $1.4 million for its Destiny Series of architectural Solid State Lighting (SSL) products and TIR's President/CEO, Leonard Hordyk, has been nominated as a finalist in the Ernst & Young Pacific Region Entrepreneur of the Year. The Destiny Series consists of six products which address a wide range of functional requirements for architectural lighting applications. “These orders represent a range of applications in North America, Europe, Japan and the Middle East”, states Darren Luce, VP Global Sales, Commercial/Industrial Markets. “TIR has experienced a great deal of interest and uptake with lighting designers in these regions who are looking for solutions that are optically sophisticated and offer high performance. The Destiny Series has been engineered and built to deliver these benefits.” Company news release. And as for Leonard... he was nominated as a finalist in the Technology category of the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award. Entrepreneurial finalists from all over the Pacific region attended a gala dinner in Vancouver on September 27th. And if that isn't enough... TIR was recently and officially ranked 3rd on the “B.C. top 100” list commissioned by the Vancouver Sun. The BC 100 list evaluates “balanced growth” in a number of key business practices, not just success in one category such as financial performance. Last year TIR was ranked 17th in the same survey by the same group. Company news release

Lumileds' Flash LEDs Make Camera Phones 12 Times Brighter
October 11, 2004...Ever wished you could capture that low light scene better with your digital camera phone? What? You don't have a camera phone yet? Well Lumileds Lighting of San Jose, California USA has made available two new Luxeon Flash LEDs that create a new level of performance, value and fun for cellphone camera users. The Luxeon Flash LXCL-PWF1 provides output of 40 lumens at 1 Ampere, and an LXCL-PWF2 LED delivers 80 lumens at 1 Ampere (wheras conventional LEDs, they say, produce just 6-7 lumens). And the new Luxeon Flash products are rated for 100,000 flashes at 1 Ampere and 168 hours of DC (flashlight/torch mode) at 350 mA. These are surface-mount products and measure only 1.0mm in height; their footprints (2.0 x 1.6 mm or 3.2 x 1.6 mm). Lumileds claims they are smallest functional camera flash sources currently on the market. “Although some camera phones have conventional LEDs that operate as ‘fun’ flash, they don’t provide sufficient light for picture-taking in dimly lit environments such as clubs and restaurants,” said Julian Carey, Lumileds Business Development Manager. “Luxeon Flash provides enough light to vibrantly render images that would otherwise not be captured.” Major cell phone manufacturers are expected to roll out models using Luxeon Flash in Japan, the U.S., Europe and Asia before the 2004 holiday season. Company news release

Densen Cao
CAO Group, Inc.
8683 South 700 West
Sandy, UT 84070
801-256-9282 (tel) ext 5598
801-495-5598 (direct)
801-256-9287 (fax)
www.caogroup.com (web)