Compared with multinational companies, Chinese LED companies still have a large gap in many aspects. How to effectively improve the core competitiveness of Chinese LED companies and actively participate in the global competition is an urgent issue we need to consider.
First, the advantage analysis
(1) The market entry threshold is lower
1. The technical research has a good research foundation and the gap between foreign countries is gradually narrowing.
Although the domestic LED industry is relatively weak and the level of technology is relatively low, some domestic enterprises have made breakthroughs in technology by hiring overseas technicians. Many enterprises have obtained independent intellectual property rights. The technical level of domestic high-quality enterprises has been compared with that of Taiwanese manufacturers. The level of technology is not much different, and the overall gap with international manufacturers is also shrinking.
2. Less investment in building the factory
The initial investment of LED is 100 million yuan, and the total assets of well-known listed companies in Lianchuang Optoelectronics and Silan Micro are more than 1 billion yuan. The entry threshold for domestic enterprises is low, and it is easy to achieve rolling development. And the liquid crystal panel manufacturing is extremely insignificant in terms of investment of billions to billions of yuan, and domestic enterprises are easy to enter into industrial clusters.
(2) Some domestic superior enterprises have already possessed core patent technology
According to the analysis of Jinqiu Caizhi Consulting, compared with microelectronics, the gap between China's LED field and foreign countries is relatively small. The first light-emitting diode (LED) independently developed by China is only a few months behind the world's first LED. Generally speaking, the current technical level of China's semiconductor light-emitting diode industry is only about three years away from developed countries. Supported by the "863" plan and Other scientific and technological plans, China has initially formed a relatively complete industrial chain from epitaxial wafer production, chip fabrication, device packaging and integration applications. Now it is a large-scale enterprise engaged in the production of semiconductor light-emitting diode devices and lighting systems. There are more than 400 products, and the product packaging has occupied a considerable share in the international market.
(III) LED mid- and downstream industries have labor cost advantages
The semiconductor lighting industry, especially the chip packaging and lighting system industry located downstream of the industrial chain, is both a technology-intensive industry and a labor-intensive industry, and its difficulty and risk are much lower than the microelectronics industry. The development of the semiconductor lighting industry can give full play to China's human resources advantages, drive related industries, and increase exports and absorb employment. After the technology is mature, LED downstream packaging and device production are labor-intensive, and China has obvious labor cost advantages.
(4) The initial formation of industrial cluster effect
China's LED industry has developed rapidly in recent years. LED products can be widely used in landscape lighting, security lighting, special lighting and general lighting sources, and its market potential is hundreds of billions of yuan. Jinqiu Caizhi Consulting believes that China's semiconductor lighting industry is entering an important period of independent innovation and leapfrog development. In 2006, the domestic chip market share reached 44%, and has successfully developed more than 140 new products in four major categories, including LED headlights and miner's lamps. From 2001 to 2006, the average annual growth rate of sales in the semiconductor lighting market was 48%. Become the world's largest producer and exporter of lighting appliances. In 2006, China's lighting industry output value of about 160 billion yuan, exports 10 billion US dollars, accounting for 18% of the global market. A battle to seize the commanding heights of semiconductor lighting emerging industries has been launched around the world. In 2006, the global semiconductor lighting market sales exceeded 7 billion US dollars, with an average annual growth rate of more than 20%. It is expected to form a potential market of 50 billion to 100 billion US dollars in the next 5-10 years.
In view of the encouraging development prospects of the semiconductor lighting industry, in recent years, Japan’s “21st Century Light Planâ€, the US “Next Generation Lighting Planâ€, the EU “Rainbow Planâ€, and the Korean “GaN Semiconductor Lighting Plan†have been launched.
In June 2003, China also established the National Semiconductor Lighting Engineering Coordination Leading Group to launch the National Semiconductor Lighting Project.
Faced with the huge temptation of the semiconductor lighting market, the world's three traditional lighting industry giants Philips, General Electric, and OSRAM also cooperated with semiconductor companies to establish a semiconductor lighting company. At present, semiconductor lighting has higher luminous efficiency than incandescent lamps, and is expanding its range of applications at a faster speed. Large-size LCD TV backlights, automotive, commercial and industrial lighting have gradually become the main application areas of LEDs. It is expected that in 2010, LED will surpass fluorescent lamps and enter the general lighting field, and the energy-saving effect will be more significant.
Semiconductor lighting is optimistic because of its convincing technology. Semiconductor lighting fixtures have significant advantages such as long life, energy saving, safety, and environmental protection. Its power consumption is only 1/10 of that of ordinary lighting, but the semiconductor lighting industry. Still surrounded by a cloud, cost and other reasons lead to its application is still being promoted. However, people in all industries are quite optimistic about the future of semiconductor lighting, and believe that the new light source will set off an alternative sport that will replace traditional fluorescent and incandescent lighting with semiconductor lighting.
As long as one-third of the incandescent lamps are replaced by semiconductor lamps, the country can save 100 billion kWh of electricity every year, which is almost equivalent to saving the annual power generation of a Three Gorges project.
LED industry chain includes LED epitaxial wafer production, LED chip production, LED chip packaging and LED product application. Among them, the epitaxial wafer has the highest technical content, and the chip is second.
Under the efforts of many enterprises and government departments, China's LED industry has initially formed four major regions in the Pearl River Delta, Yangtze River Delta, Southeast China, Beijing and Dalian, and each region has basically formed a relatively complete industrial chain. Generally speaking, China's LED industry pattern has a high degree of industrialization in the south, while the north relies on many universities and research institutions to have strong research and development capabilities. In terms of geographical distribution, the Pearl River Delta and the Yangtze River Delta are the most concentrated areas of the domestic LED industry. The upstream, middle and lower reaches of the industrial chain are relatively complete, and more than 80% of the relevant enterprises in the country are concentrated. It is also the fastest growing region of the domestic LED industry, and the comprehensive advantages of the industry. More obvious. LED equipment and raw material suppliers have settled in these two regions. The convenient connection with the international application market has created a good service and market environment for the development of the LED industry. The industrial cluster effect is gradually emerging.
(5) Industrial policy support products have broad prospects for development
The Ministry of Finance plans to increase the promotion of high-efficiency lighting products in 2009 and vigorously promote the use of energy-saving. At present, China's annual electricity for lighting is close to 250 billion kWh. If one-third of semiconductor lighting is used, it can save 80 billion kWh per year, which is basically equivalent to the total power generation of the Three Gorges Power Station. To this end, the policy is vigorously guiding and promoting energy-saving lamps. In particular, the use of financial subsidies to support such as semiconductor (LED) efficient lighting products.
Due to the unique advantages of energy saving, emission reduction and environmental protection, LED (Light Emitting Diode) has experienced explosive growth in recent years. It is estimated that the global LED market will grow to 12.3 billion US dollars in 2012. Among them, the output value of China's LED industry will exceed 100 billion yuan by 2010. The main patents and high-end products of this product are controlled by the top 5 manufacturers in Europe, America and Japan, and the entrants are vulnerable to patent litigation. It can be said that domestic manufacturers that already have LED semiconductor materials have a certain degree of technological monopoly advantage.
In the secondary market, semiconductor energy-saving materials stocks have also been sought after by the market. Like Sanan Optoelectronics, the main business LED, the stock price has risen sharply because of the subject speculation. The cumulative increase since the start of the bottom has exceeded 200%, showing investors' enthusiasm for LED new energy materials. At present, in the domestic LED industry, in addition to the industry leader Sanan Optoelectronics, the fastest growing China Microelectronics and Shi Weilan.
In short, China's LED lighting industry faces unprecedented policy opportunities, unexpected technological upgrading space, huge market potential, and broad development prospects. However, whether China can seize the opportunities of LED industry development and become bigger and stronger will ultimately depend on itself. Independent innovation is the only way out for China's LED industry to break through. Only through continuous innovation can China's LED industry develop a "Chinese-style" road and gain more voice and dominance in the increasingly internationalized competition. Only through continuous innovation can we enlarge and strengthen the Chinese LED industry under broad market opportunities.
(6) The domestic market for downstream applications has huge capacity and has potential for development
The main application field of domestic LED, in addition to a large number of displays for various electrical appliances and devices, instruments, equipment, etc., mainly concentrated in:
1, large, medium and small LED display: indoor and outdoor billboards, stadium scoreboards, information display.
2. Traffic lights: traffic lights, highways, railways and airport lights in the city's major and medium cities.
3, light color lighting: outdoor landscape lighting and interior lighting.
4, dedicated general lighting: portable lighting (flashlights, headlights), low illumination lighting (lane lights, house lights, court lights), reading lighting (aircraft, train, car reading lights), microscope lights, camera flash, table lamp Street lights.
5. Safety lighting: miner's lamp, explosion-proof lamp, emergency light, safety indicator light.
6, special lighting: military lighting (no infrared radiation), medical surgical lights (no heat radiation), medical treatment lamps, crops and flowers dedicated lighting.
From the domestic LED application market, architectural lighting, display screens and traffic signal lights accounted for 56% of the total, the total growth of these markets is relatively fast, but relatively scattered, technical standards are not uniform; and in the small-size backlight and automotive applications Only 7%.
According to the analysis of Jinqiu Caizhi Consulting, the domestic market is huge in general. The main market of LED in the future is the general lighting market. The market capacity is large, the terminal consumer market is relatively scattered, and it is not easy to form a monopoly. The domestic enterprises have a vast living space.
Second, the disadvantage analysis
(1) Domestic enterprises are generally small in scale
At present, among the enterprises engaged in the production of LED lighting products, high-end products are still dominated by foreign manufacturers. In contrast, domestic LED lighting manufacturers generally have a small scale, weak technical strength, and low product quality.
From the perspective of regional distribution, domestic lighting production enterprises are mainly distributed in the Pearl River Delta and the Yangtze River Delta. Similar to the distribution of traditional lighting companies, China's LED lighting companies are also mainly distributed in the above two regions. However, compared with the Yangtze River Delta region, many LED packaging companies and accessory manufacturers are located in the Pearl River Delta region. The Pearl River Delta region has a more complete LED industry chain, so LED lighting companies are more distributed in the Pearl River Delta region.
(2) Technology limited high-end customers
China's high-efficiency, high-reliability LED application products rely almost entirely on imported high-end epitaxial chips. Although China's LED epitaxial chip production has made great progress and progress in recent years, it still stays at the middle and low level.
According to Jinqiu Caizhi Consulting, at present, high-performance LED chips and power LED chips are still available in China, and still need a large amount of imports, which seriously restricts the development of the entire LED industry.
The technical level of LED products of domestic enterprises still has a certain gap with overseas, and it is at a disadvantage in striving for high-end customers.
(3) The manufacturing base of LED upstream products is weak
LED production processes include single crystal growth and epitaxial growth, chip fabrication and packaging. Single crystal growth and epitaxial growth are generally regarded as upstream of this industry, chip manufacturing is midstream, and packaging and application are downstream. The upstream of the industrial chain is characterized by technology and capital intensiveness, and the downstream entry threshold is relatively low. From the perspective of the industrial chain, China's LED substrate, epitaxy, and chip links are relatively weak.
(4) The lack of core patents restricts the development of industrial internationalization strategy
The lack of domestic core patents, especially in the absence of Blu-ray core patents and white light patents related to the long-term development of the industry, will constrain the long-term development of domestic industries. At present, Chinese local enterprises are still in the initial stage. The scale of enterprises is small, and it is not a threat to the mastery of patents. The patent issue is not very prominent. However, with the development and growth of domestic enterprises, once the scale is expanded to a certain extent and the “going out†development strategy is implemented, the patent issue will become a hidden danger. At present, for domestic enterprises, it is the primary task to strengthen the product quality and technology level, improve the ability to obtain the price of the patent in the future, or gradually break through the core patent through research and development.
Third, the opportunity analysis
(1) Architectural lighting, indoor and outdoor displays will still dominate the market
China's current application market is mainly in architectural lighting, indoor and outdoor display. LED displays have been widely used in banks, securities, plazas, stations, and stadiums due to their ease of assembly, low power consumption, and high brightness. In the future, this market still has great growth potential. Under the promotion of the Olympic Games, the World Expo, the demonstration effect of some urban nightscape projects and the favorable factors such as the national semiconductor lighting project, the architectural lighting market is still promising. The future market architectural lighting and indoor and outdoor display screens will still dominate the market.
(2) Great potential in the field of mobile phones, small-size LCD backlights, automobiles, and special lighting
LED has achieved mature and wide application and popularity in the field of small-size LCD panels such as mobile phones, MP3, MP4, DC/DV and PDA. With the popularity of color-screen mobile phones, high-pixel camera phones, large-screen audio-visual phones, and multi-function 3G phones, it is expected that the number of LEDs required for each mobile phone will be as high as 12-18. Therefore, it is expected that the number of LEDs required for domestically produced mobile phones will reach 6 billion in the next few years. Domestic packaging companies are actively carrying out technology research and development or introducing equipment to improve production capacity and product quality. In particular, in recent years, small-size LCD backlight factories in Japan and Korea are moving to China.
The domestic LED automotive lighting market has exceeded 1 billion yuan. With the improvement of the technical level of LED lighting components and the decline of product prices, LED combination taillights, LED brake lights, LED turn signals, etc. will become the mainstream configuration of China's car lights. It is estimated that in 2010 China's LED front-loading market (OEM supporting market), LED combination taillights, LED central high-position brake lights, automotive instruments, instrument backlights and other LED lights will reach 4 billion yuan. The next application trend for automotive LEDs will be automotive headlights.
The domestic solar LED lighting output value exceeds 3 billion yuan. LED is low-voltage, DC power supply, and it is very compatible with the low-voltage and DC power supply methods of solar photovoltaic cells. The combination of the two does not require an AC inverter, and truly realizes the combination of new energy and new light source. Solar semiconductor lighting lawn lights, garden lights, signal lights, etc. have begun to be used in domestic communities, garden construction, and rural area road lighting. At present, China has occupied more than 80% of the global solar semiconductor lighting products market.
(3) LED traffic indicator market tends to be saturated
The market size of traffic lights is over 1 billion yuan.
At present, China's high-brightness LED urban traffic signals have also been widely used and tend to be saturated. For example, Shanghai clearly stipulates that all new traffic lights will use LED as the light source. In addition, LED has a broad application prospect in railway signal. The traditional signal machine uses a double filament incandescent bulb as the light source, and the lamp life is only 1000 hours. The Chinese government plans to build an average of 1,700 kilometers of railway lines every year in the future. By 2020, the total length of China's railway lines will reach 100,000 kilometers. High-reliability, safety and low-maintenance high-brightness LEDs will have a lot to offer. Moreover, railway signal and lighting products such as hand-held signal lights, passenger bedside reading lights, safety sign lights, etc. are also beginning to use LEDs. China's high-speed development of highways, airports, seaports and other fields of signal, marking lamps, is also very useful for LED applications. Potential market.
Fourth, threat analysis
(1) Foreign-funded technology market
At present, foreign capital mainly leads LED high-end products. Unlike the new color TVs and network functions of domestic color TV companies, Sony and Samsung products use LED backlight technology and focus on ultra-thin concepts. Foreign-funded color TV companies will take the lead in the future LED LCD TV market.
LED light source LCD TV is considered to be the main trend in the evolution of liquid crystal display technology. This technology can make the LCD TV display better, the volume is thinner and lighter, and it is also more energy-saving and environmentally friendly. The representative LED LCD TV in the domestic color TV market is a 42-inch product launched by Hisense in June 2006. Hisense LED LCD TV is the fifth product in the world to master this technology, and it is also the first mass-produced LED TV in the domestic market.
(2) The high-end market is still monopolized by foreign capital
The world's LED giant packaging factory and Taiwan's advanced packaging companies clustered in the mainland, not only brought advanced packaging technology and talents, but also brought advanced packaging customer flow and information flow, providing direct or indirect for China's domestic packaging companies Learning exchange opportunities, and the training of local advanced packaging technology talents can also be used for me. But at the same time, because the overall level of China's packaging and testing industry is not high, almost all high-end packaging capacity is monopolized.
(3) Taiwanese capital and international giants entering the domestic market have intensified competition
At present, Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen and other first-tier cities, with the first batch of LED display screens being counted in the replacement period, customers pay more attention to product quality and maintenance services, and the requirements for products are higher than before. Therefore, the "extensive" market model can no longer meet the needs of users. It is precisely because of this kind of market transformation characteristics that a group of first-class enterprises that enjoy high popularity in foreign countries have entered the Chinese market and have become domestically. The local team has brought a huge impact on the LED market, which was quite competitive. The reason why they bring the impact is huge, because they have many years of experience abroad, the products have experienced the test of mature markets, forming an irresistible brand advantage.
(4) Patent restrictions
As an emerging and potentially huge industry, LED lighting is receiving wide attention from all over the world, and its development prospects are also affected by many factors. Due to the huge role of patent technology in the development of LED and its unique patent distribution, patent transfer, authorization and disputes will greatly affect the future development of the LED industry.
The core patents of LED lighting technology are basically controlled by several major foreign companies, such as Japan's Nichia, Toyota Synthetic, Toshiba, Umileds of the United States, Cree, and Osram of Germany. These companies use their core patents to adopt a horizontal (simultaneous access to multiple countries) and vertical (continuous improvement of design, follow-up applications) expansion methods, and a rigorous patent network is deployed worldwide.
For the latecomers of the LED industry in Taiwan, China, and South Korea, although the LED industry has already had a certain scale, its development in the patent technology has been greatly restricted by patents. This situation is in Taiwan, China. The performance is most outstanding.
However, these regions, especially those in Taiwan and South Korea, have made some innovations in technology, and have made some progress in securing authorization. The patent pattern has also changed quietly.
It is expected that in the next few years, the transfer, authorization and disputes of international patents will show the following characteristics and trends:
1. NICHIA is still the main sponsor of technology transfer, authorization and litigation
Due to its dominance in LED blue chip and white LED patent technology, Nichia will continue to dominate in patent transfer, authorization and litigation in the next few years. Although Osram-based European and American companies have a positive attitude toward technology transfer authorization, subject to patent restrictions, the dominant direction of patent licensing is still determined by Nichia.
From the number of authorizations and disputes, Nichia dominates about 60% of all authorizations and disputes, followed by Osram. This situation will not change much in recent years.
2, Nichia's external authorization will continue to increase
In terms of patent licensing, European and American companies have always been more active in Japanese companies. With the enhancement of technology patents by Osram, Lumileds and other companies and the increased authorization for Taiwanese and Korean companies, companies such as Nichia will accelerate the speed of external authorization from their own interests. In particular, in the case of a decline in profits such as Nichia and TG in 2005, patent licensing or commissioning will be a very worthwhile option.
In addition, the possibility of technological breakthroughs in South Korea and Taiwanese companies or the authorization of other companies to avoid Nichia patent litigation has increased significantly. Authorized production will also be the best choice for Japanese LED companies in the event that patent litigation cannot limit Taiwanese companies from continuing to compete for market space.
Nichia intends to open the patent license, will be based on the larger downstream packaging plant, and will not be related to the special? Authorized companies are the priority, and Taiwanese companies will be the focus.
3. Mutual authorization will be further increased
Nichia's technology monopoly ability is constantly decreasing, and its ability to file lawsuits against chip makers such as Taiwan and South Korea has gradually weakened. In addition, as these manufacturers gradually develop unique patented technologies, some of the unique patents will also bring greater product quality enhancements to patent monopolies such as Nichia, and the possibility of mutual authorization between these companies and companies such as Nichia is gradually strengthened. .
At present, the main technical threat facing Nichia is mainly from Taiwan. Such as: Taiwan's ITO technology can be in the chip manufacturing process? Do too much adjustment, and? There is considerable advantage in the yield and cost control. ? Apply it to Nichia's chip production, and immediately upgrade its products? ? 30%-50%, in related materials? When technology is still unable to break through effectively, is Nichia upgrading its products? ? Is it expected to be quite attractive? So this kind of technology is ok? Low infringement litigation disputes can also serve as a bargaining chip for interaction with Nichia.
4. Domestic companies face patent disputes, but still have a chance to break through
China's LED technology started late, and it is in a relatively passive situation in LED patents. The development situation is not optimistic. As the scale of the company continues to expand, it may be involved in special disputes due to the attention of major international companies.
With the expansion of domestic LED export scale and the reduction of patent litigation in Taiwan and South Korea, it is not ruled out that Nichia and other large companies will shift the focus of patent litigation to domestic enterprises.
However, China's LED industry still has the opportunity to make breakthroughs, breaking this passive patent pattern, mainly in the following two points:
1. China has certain advantages in composite substrate patents and has the opportunity to transform into stronger competitiveness.
2. The chip technology of white light general lighting may be quite different from the existing technology. At present, it is basically at the starting line with large foreign companies. As long as the opportunity is seized, it is possible to obtain an active position.
If in these two aspects, domestically obtain practical patent technology, domestic enterprises will be more likely to obtain authorization from foreign patent monopoly enterprises, or even mutual authorization, to change the passive situation of domestic patents.
According to Jinqiu Caizhi Consulting, China has a technology branch in each technical field that has applied for more or more foreign applications, especially in the upstream industry, which has some patents for peripheral inventions. Negotiated chips are provided.
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