LED lighting chip core equipment industrialization "difficult"
China's first and global fourth mass production LED lighting chip core equipment manufacturing project aimed at breaking the monopoly of foreign technology. On January 19, 2009, it was located in Nanhai District, Foshan City, Guangdong Province. This means that the core equipment that restricts the bottleneck of China's LED lighting industry is expected to be localized. However, it is still time to consider whether it can be industrialized. However, the reality is that the exploration of the industrialization of chip core equipment in China in the early stage ended in failure.
However, China's epitaxial chip industry has developed rapidly, from several in 2000 to nearly 60 today. Businesses have a great demand for equipment and materials. In 2008 alone, domestically imported MOCVD was between 35 and 40 units, and it was mainly production equipment. In 2009, it is more optimistic to estimate that the number of MOCVD imports may reach 50-60 units.
There are many devices involved in the upstream, and it is also very important. It mainly includes MOVCVD, X-ray, AFM, CV/Hall, PL/EL, leak detection and baking equipment for epitaxial use, lithography, degumming, ICP/RIE, PECVD, E-beam evaporation for chip manufacturing, Sputtering, cleaning, drying, microscope, step meter, ellipsometer, grinding and polishing, dicing, chip testing, sorting, etc. The raw materials and auxiliary materials include MO source, ammonia gas, silane, phosphine, arsine, hydrogen, nitrogen, hydrogen chloride gas and the like. The equipment required for the upstream of the LED is characterized by high price and long delivery time. For example, the MOCVD required for epitaxy, the production equipment is generally about 2 million US dollars, and the delivery time is generally 6-8 months. More than 90% of these upstream equipment mentioned above are imported, and the main components are also imported. Therefore, the proportion of equipment and raw materials in the LED industry has a high to low trend from upstream to downstream.
Currently in these two areas, the localization process is still very unsatisfactory, and key equipment is particularly weak. In the field of upstream materials, substrate materials and epitaxial materials are relatively backward. In recent years, great progress has been made, but problems in research and development and investment have not been fundamentally improved.
At the same time, the research and major applications of large-scale system integration technology are progressing smoothly. The product range and scale of application products are at the forefront of the world, and it has become the largest producer and exporter of LED full-color display, solar LED, landscape lighting and other application products. Tianjin FAW Xiali and Changzhou Xingyu have developed LED car headlights. In July 2008, Hisense’s first 42-inch ultra-thin LED-backlit LCD TV was launched. It has sold nearly 10,000 units, indicating 40% of world production. Chinese consumer electronics began to use LED technology on a large scale.
In summary, the current basic competition pattern of Chinese LED chip production is that the number of manufacturers is small, and the existing manufacturers' technology is biased towards the R&D and production of high-brightness chips, and the degree of competition of enterprises is still relatively low.
From the current stage, the main problems in the extension and chip industrialization are as follows: First, there are fewer core technologies with innovative and independent intellectual property rights, and it is difficult to compete with foreign counterparts. Second, high-performance LED chips and power LED chips are currently rare in China and still require a large amount of imports, which seriously restricts the development of the entire LED industry. Third, many research results at home and abroad, such as new technologies, new structures and new processes of chips, are difficult to promote and apply in enterprises. This may be an institutional problem. Fourth, the industrialization scale of domestic and foreign companies and chip companies is small, the research and development strength of enterprises is insufficient, the output is low, the product cost is high, and the competitiveness is lacking.
Can high-end applications force LED chip revitalization?
The Beijing Olympic Games is not only a competition for sports athletes and hard work in various countries, but also a stage for LED to showcase its own style and charm. The outstanding performance of LED in the opening performance, Olympic venues, landscape lighting, indoor and outdoor full-color display, etc., brought a shocking visual feast to the audience, which made people have a more intuitive, profound and new experience and awareness of LED. The application and promotion of LED will undoubtedly further accelerate. Experts predict that the 2010 Shanghai World Expo will become another milestone in LED applications, when China's LED industry will usher in a new development peak.
However, behind the dazzling and brilliant LED of the Beijing Olympic Games, there is a lack of China's upstream core technology in LED, which hides the hidden concerns of the industry. It is understood that the LED devices and lamps used in the Olympic Games are mainly packaged and produced by Chinese companies, but the most high-power chips in the value chain are basically imported from abroad. The Beijing Olympic Games has improved the level of LED applications, but it also reflects that China's LED products are mainly medium and low-end, lacking core technologies with independent intellectual property rights. High-performance LEDs and power LED products all depend on the dilemma of imports.
Although the production of LED epitaxial chips in China has made great progress and progress in recent years, it still stays at the middle and low level, and can not be applied to high-quality displays on a large scale, as well as high-end applications such as medium and large-size LCD backlights. High-end epitaxial chips used in high-efficiency, high-reliability LED applications rely almost entirely on imports, and high-efficiency power chips are currently not available from domestic manufacturers.
Peng Wanhua, secretary-general of the Optoelectronic Devices Branch of China Optical Optoelectronics Industry Association, said: From the current stage, the main problems in epitaxy and chip industrialization are: First, there are fewer core technologies with innovative and independent intellectual property rights. Compete with foreign counterparts. Second, high-performance LED chips and power LED chips are currently rare in China and still require a large amount of imports, which seriously restricts the development of the entire LED industry. Third, many research results at home and abroad, such as new technologies, new structures and new processes of chips, are difficult to promote and apply in enterprises. This may be an institutional problem. Fourth, the industrialization scale of domestic and foreign companies and chip companies is small, the research and development strength of enterprises is insufficient, the output is low, the product cost is high, and the competitiveness is lacking.
At present, China's governments at all levels are supporting the LED industry in a hot way, such as “urban lighting projectâ€, various demonstration projects, public inspection platforms, etc., which essentially benefit the middle and lower reaches of the industry, while the upstream chips receive The funds are not only small but also scattered. The objective reason is that the upstream chip has a large investment demand and high risk, while the investment demand in the middle and lower reaches is relatively small and it is easy to achieve the promotion effect quickly.
However, while paying attention to these demonstration projects, let us look at some of the behind-the-scenes:
Although there are some manufacturers in China that can provide low-power LED chips for display and backlight applications, in the face of huge lighting application market, no one in China can provide high-power LED chips that can be mass-produced. Although some local chip makers are trying to develop high-power LED chips, the R&D plan has been blocked or dismantled due to the financial crisis.
Due to the lack of high-end domestic chips, and the chips of Taiwanese foundries are not controlled by the five giants' patents, and the US threat to the "337" investigation of the LED industry, the domestic packaging and application manufacturers Only foreign chips can be selected. Due to monopoly, foreign chip manufacturers have always refused to lower the price of chips in order to maximize profits. For domestic packaging and application manufacturers, in order to maintain the low profit of products, they have to reduce other costs, resulting in Many packaging and application manufacturers have to shift their production bases from costly coastal cities, such as Shenzhen, to lower-cost inland areas. The migration of Shenzhen Fangda National Science to the Northeast is a testimony.
Even Dai Guoqiang, deputy director of the Department of Science and Technology of the Ministry of Science and Technology, said with emotion: "In the upstream, compared with the international giants, China is still in a weak situation, especially in the blockade of intellectual property, how do we respond to the future? The challenge: small enterprise scale, poor product reliability, lack of corporate brand, and high-end market will be a major issue that we must address in the next step in the development of the semiconductor lighting industry."
Perhaps, we believe more, "in terms of application is more worthy of our attention. As an emerging technology application field, its application market needs our application talents to guide and support, but in this respect, the company does not have enough strength and research. The institution has not given enough attention to it as an important direction, which is likely to be one of the biggest difficulties in our next development."
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