LED lighting driver chip is a key component of LED products. Over the past two years, the LED lighting driver chip industry has fallen into a low tide due to overcapacity and the continuous decline in the price of LED lighting driver chips for general lighting.
The new generation of display technology Mini / micro led and the third generation (compound) semiconductor are opening a new round of growth curve of LED lighting driver chip industry. These emerging high margin areas have also attracted many led enterprises to compete for layout with the high margin brought by the high technology threshold.
LED lighting driver chip industry shows obvious periodicity, usually about 4 years is a cycle length, and the prosperity of the industry is affected by the relationship between supply and demand.
LED lighting driver chip is the most core link in the process of LED production. It is a solid-state semiconductor device. Its main function is to convert electric energy into light energy. Its advantages and disadvantages directly affect the performance and quality of terminal LED products. The technical development level determines the penetration and coverage of downstream applications.
The LED industry chain consists of substrate processing, LED epitaxial wafer production, chip manufacturing and device packaging. Compared with the packaging and application links, LED lighting driver chips are greatly affected by the relationship between supply and demand, and the gross profit margin fluctuates. LED lighting driver chips account for about 65% of the cost of packaging products, and LED lighting driver chips in terminal products (taking lighting products as an example) account for about 18% of the total cost.
According to CSA data, in the manufacturing cost of LED lighting driver chips, substrate wafers account for about 50%, depreciation and others account for 35%, metal organic reaction sources account for 10% and others account for about 5%.
The preparation of ED epitaxial wafer is an important step in the production of LED lighting driver chip.
The preparation purpose of LED epitaxial chip is to generate specific single crystal film on the substrate. MOCVD is the most key equipment in the production process of LED lighting drive chip. Its process and technology are extremely complex. It is also the most expensive equipment in the manufacturing process of LED lighting drive chip, accounting for almost half of the cost of LED epitaxial chip.
Major international suppliers include Veeco of the United States, aixtron of Germany and Nippon sanso of Japan. MOCVD produced by Japanese manufacturers has always been only supplied to Japanese enterprises, not exported; Veeco in the United States and aixtron in Germany are facing the competition of Chinese MOCVD enterprises, and their advantages are gradually lost.
From the perspective of MOCVD equipment ownership and annual new increment, mainland manufacturers continue to remain at the forefront of the world.
As the LED industry begins to seek new growth power from UV LED, miniled and micro led, the market scale of MOCVD equipment is expected to usher in a new upward trend. Market.us predicts that by 2028, the market scale of MOCVD will double to US $1.638 billion, with a CAGR of 8.5%.
Mini / micro LED is the development product of small spacing led. It has a high-density integrated LED array. The chip size is in the order of microns, which can greatly improve the resolution of the display screen. It is superior to the current LCD display in brightness, contrast, color reduction and energy saving, and has a broad market prospect.
According to yole's prediction, the global Mini / micro LED output value will reach US $1.38 billion in 2022.
When miniled is used as backlight, it is only used as light source, so only thousands or tens of thousands of LED lighting driver chips will be used (taking TV as an example), while the number of LED lighting driver chips used in micro LED / mini led direct display is 100000 or millions. More chips put forward higher requirements for chip production and transfer process, increasing technical difficulty and further improving the importance of products.
Compared with traditional LED, the technical difficulty of miniled lighting driver chip is further increased. Whether it is used as backlight or direct display, the core difficulty lies in the chip end.
Terminal manufacturers pay more attention to the product certification of miniled lighting driver chips, and the management of the industrial chain is also extended to the chip link. Therefore, compared with traditional LED lighting driver chips which are connected with sealed test manufacturers, miniled lighting driver chip manufacturers cooperate more directly with terminal brand manufacturers.
At present, Apple's miniled crystal grains have started to produce at the end of 2020, and the quarterly shipment of 300000-400000 pieces is limited by the yield. The domestic miniled supply chain is also ready to go, and large-scale application will also bring new development space to the upstream sapphire material field.
In recent years, the LED lighting driver chip industry as a whole is under the background of downward adjustment. With the players who lack competitive advantage beginning to withdraw from the market one after another, the concentration of LED lighting driver chip industry has gradually increased, and the head effect has begun to appear.
As one of the highest threshold links in the LED industry chain, the non visible light product market has been occupied by overseas enterprises.
In recent years, overseas enterprises have been cutting down production, and the LED lighting drive chip industry chain has been transferred to Chinese mainland. In the visible field, besides the headlights and other high-power products, 85% of the market is being accelerated by domestic chip enterprises. The packaging and application links of the middle and lower reaches have been leading the chip link to Chinese mainland.