The impact of the "rise" of China's LED industry on the international LED industry
"Thirty years of Hedong, thirty years of Hexi". In the past few years, traditional lighting manufacturers such as Europe, America, Japan and South Korea have made strategic adjustments one after another. Of course, we can see that the series of adjustments made by the world's giants are not unrelated to the "rise" of my country's LED industry. In fact, my country, which has the world's largest LED lighting production and use market, with its advantages of low cost and high power, has enabled many domestic companies to quickly update their products. In addition, the quotations are also "cheap", which can Export to all over the world at a price that is closer to the general consumer.
As the competition in the global LED lighting industry intensifies, in order to cope with my country's LED companies, the world's giants have to use the method of "relieving respect and reducing expensive" to seize market share. However, some people in the industry pointed out that the world's major manufacturers are subject to bloated organizations and low efficiency, high production costs, and gradually losing market advantages. Under such a general trend, many large companies in the world can only adopt the separation of lighting business to deal with market challenges, and start to develop from low-profit general lighting to high-profit, high-tech fields, so as to differentiate with Chinese companies. competition.
It is undeniable that from the supply side, the influence of mainland LED manufacturers is gradually increasing. So, what are the world's big manufacturers that are relatively "declining" in the global LED industry now? Below, the editor will give us a summary of the development status of many representative world manufacturers across Asia and Europe, and outline their latest actions and future directions for you to know yourself and your enemy for reference.
Philips Lighting: Re-expanding the scope of business, deeply cultivating in the era of Internet of Things
On March 31, 2015, Philips announced that a merger and acquisition fund led by Jinshajiang GOScale Capital and supported by Chinese and foreign consortiums such as Asia Pacific Capital Development Investment Co., Ltd. and Nanchang Industrial Holdings Group Co., Ltd. planned to acquire Royal Philips of the Netherlands. The company's 80.1% stake in Lumileds aims to focus on medical equipment such as medical scanners and consumer products such as coffee machines after selling a large stake in the subsidiary. On January 22 of the following year, Philips announced that it would suspend the sale of relevant business to Chinese investors due to opposition from the US regulatory authorities. The CEO of Philips was said to have been "very desperate" at the time, but he was eager to sell the Lumileds part and was looking for other interested buyers. As of May 3, Philips once again announced that it will spin off its lighting equipment part, Philips Lighting, for an initial public offering. The move is said to allow Philips to focus more on becoming a medical technology provider.
A few days ago (August 17), Philips Lighting released its lighting strategic plan at the 2016 media conference held in Beijing, clarifying that the primary development direction for the next step is intelligent interconnection. It is understood that the current Philips lighting business includes outdoor, retail and hotel, industrial and home lighting and other fields, providing a full range of lighting solutions from light sources, lamps, products, systems to services. In today's rapid development of the Internet, Philips will promote the development of the Internet of Things in the lighting industry under the premise of energy saving and environmental protection. According to the report, at this media conference, Philips Lighting revealed its latest intelligent interconnected LED lighting system and products in the Internet of Things era, and brought the smart home lighting system - Philips Hue's full range of products to the event site. Obviously, in the current environment of increasingly sophisticated smart homes, Philips aims to enhance professional leadership in the Internet of Things era through product, system and service innovation.
Osram: Repeatedly buying related properties, gathering three major "base affairs"
On July 26, 2016, a Chinese consortium consisting of limited partners such as the strategic investor IDG Capital, Mulinsen and Yiwu State-owned Capital Operation Base acquired Osram's spin-off asset LEDVANCE for over 400 million euros. It is reported that the sale of LEDVANCE is a crucial step for Osram in the process of developing into a high-tech lighting company. After that, Osram will focus on three "base affairs", including special lighting (SP), lighting systems and solutions. (LSS) and optoelectronic semiconductor (OS) growth and innovation.
According to reports, in order to enrich the product line of LED lights and better develop the US market, in order to consolidate its leading position in the global automotive lighting industry, Osram signed a purchase agreement on July 19 to bring a well-known American automotive LED module manufacturer. Novità Technologies takes over. In addition, Osram, which is active in planning entertainment lighting, also acquired the assets of ADB TTVSAS, which provides theater and TV lighting solutions. The product line includes lamps, dimmers and lighting central control. After the acquisition, it will become a subsidiary Part of the company Clay Paky.
GE Lighting: Concentrating on LED technology, closing two traditional lighting factories in the United States
Recently, GE Lighting announced that in order to focus on LED technology, it will close two traditional lighting production plants in Lexington, Kentucky, USA in August 2017. According to reports, the two factories are the Lexington Lighting Factory and the Somerset Glass Factory. The Lexington Light Factory, which makes conventional lamps, employs about 139 workers, while the Glass Factory, which primarily produces halogen lamps, employs 71 workers. The move is estimated to affect about 400 jobs in the city. In fact, consumer demand for traditional lighting products has hit a record low. GE said in a statement earlier that the Lexington plant was operating at about 15% capacity.
Recently, GE, which is active in planning new fields, also announced the establishment of a strategic partnership with Huawei. Its industrial Internet development plan will be combined with Huawei's sophisticated information and communication technology (ICT) to accelerate the development of innovative applications for the industrial Internet. According to this cooperation, Huawei will also choose Predix as the preferred platform for Internet of Things (IoT) development. At the same time, GE and Huawei will also collaborate to develop end-to-end applications for customers based on Huawei's product line and experience in Internet and IT infrastructure. It is estimated that in 2020, my country's Internet of Things market will reach 166 billion US dollars. According to this, my country's telecom, Ernst & Young, Capgemini, Intel and other industry giants have all participated in the GE Digital Alliance project.
Samsung Electronics: Invested 26 trillion throughout the year to boost semiconductor and OLED production capacity
Entering the second half of 2016, in order to strengthen its competitiveness, Samsung's capital expenditure is said to be "unreserved", and its budget will exceed 17 trillion won. Technology Pharmaceutical Affairs. According to the Korea Economic Daily, its expenditure in the first half of the year has reached 8.8 trillion won, which means that the annual investment is expected to exceed 26 trillion won. Meanwhile, NAND flash memory and OLED mobile panels are the key investment projects in the second half of the year.
Samsung executive director Lee Myung-jin said that demand for 3DNAND chips and OLED panels will see explosive growth, which is the focus of investment this year. Through large-scale plans to expand production capacity, Samsung hopes to widen the lead in the above areas. The latest data from IC Insights, a semiconductor research organization, shows that Samsung’s semiconductor revenue in the second quarter increased by 11% quarter-on-quarter to $10.3 billion, while Intel’s quarterly revenue decreased by 1% to $12.9 billion in the same period. $2.6 billion.
Panasonic: It is planned to expand the lighting business, and the business points should be placed in the non-residential category
According to Japanese media reports, Panasonic previously disclosed that by fiscal year 2018, it will increase the sales revenue of lighting business from 320.3 billion yen (equivalent to RMB 20.22 billion) in fiscal year 2015 to 400 billion yen (equivalent to RMB 25.26 billion) . According to statistics, the market share of Panasonic LED lighting in the Japanese lighting market is as high as about 40%. Panasonic believes that in Japan, with the gradual popularization of LED lighting, the sales of traditional lighting have also declined accordingly, and the market prospect is not optimistic. Therefore, in addition to lighting appliances for residences and shops, as well as LED bulbs and lighting components, Panasonic will focus on non-residential areas such as office and road lighting in the future.
In addition, LED headlights are also one of the key development points of Panasonic lighting in recent years. In 2015, Panasonic used aluminum nitride material to make a new type of semiconductor laser, increasing the output power of the laser to 4.5W and the irradiation interval to 700 meters, and plans to put this technology into practice before 2019. On May 9 this year, Panasonic and Xingyu Co., Ltd. signed a "Strategic Cooperation Agreement" to open strategic cooperation in the field of automotive electronics such as LED automotive lighting and sensors. Panasonic also announced that in fiscal 2018, it will increase the sales revenue of European lighting business to 36 billion yen from 30 billion yen in fiscal year 2014. In view of the low penetration rate of LEDs in Europe compared with Japan, LED lighting related components will be the main development market in the future.
Cree: working on LED components, selling Wolfspeed to Infineon
On July 14, 2016, American LED manufacturer Cree announced to sell its power and RF wireless radio frequency components work Wolfspeed to German manufacturer Infineon for US$850 million. Infineon's predecessor was Siemens' semiconductor work, and it is now one of the key companies of the Siemens Group. It is reported that this transaction is a typical example of getting what you need, which will not only allow Cree to focus more on LED components, make it a company that focuses more on LED lighting quickly, and provide major capital for accelerating its development; It can enable Infineon to obtain more skills and capital, and continue to expand the product line in the fields of automotive electronics and mobile phones, as well as in the fields of energy, green energy and the Internet of Things.
As the largest semiconductor company in Europe, Infineon bought Cree's Wolfspeed work for $850 million in cash. The acquisition is expected to expand Infineon's product line to include a range of sensors, radar and security products. It is reported that Cree spun off the power semiconductor business to establish Wolfspeed. The original plan was to collect more funds from the public market for the IPO. Now, it has changed its original intention and sold it to Infineon, which has a strong interest in this, at a satisfactory price, which can also increase the cost. Let go of the LED work and focus more on LED lighting work, including LED chips, LED bulbs, and power switching components (optical couplers).
Toshiba: Exit my country's lighting market, Konka accepts lighting business in China
Last (July) month, Anhui Konka Green Lighting Technology Co., Ltd. and Toshiba formally handed over, and launched a strategic cooperation and supply agreement with Toshiba Lighting Co., Ltd., mainly through equity transfer and asset transfer, to accept Toshiba Lighting in the company. China's lighting business, involving an amount of more than 1 billion yuan. After the relevant agreement, Konka Lighting obtained the right to use the "TOSHIBA Toshiba" brand of Toshiba Lighting in mainland China and Hong Kong shopping malls. This is after Samsung, the Japanese domestic manufacturer Toshiba also announced its withdrawal from my country's lighting market. According to leaks, Konka Group, as a veteran home appliance company in my country, officially entered the LED lighting industry at the end of 2008. After reaching strategic cooperation with Toshiba Lighting, it will expand the commodity supply chain and add three production bases in Kunshan, Fuzhou and Huizhou. It will quickly increase to 1 billion yuan, and will greatly increase the total output in 2016. After a series of combined actions, the sales target of 2 billion yuan in the next three years and 5 billion yuan in five years will be achieved.
It is reported that on February 26 this year, Toshiba Lighting Technology Co., Ltd. announced that it will sell its subsidiary that manufactures and sells light bulbs and lighting appliances in my country to Konka Group, focusing its operating costs on the lighting business in Japan, including planning smaller businesses. Inside, it will fully promote structural changes and accelerate the recovery of the Group's profitability. In addition to the two companies in Fuzhou and Hong Kong, part of the business of Toshiba Lighting's subsidiary located in Kunshan City, Jiangsu Province was also sold to Konka's subsidiaries, and a total of about 1,000 factory workers will be transferred to Konka. The production and sale of commercial lighting such as vehicle lighting entered in Kunshan City will still be preserved by the subsidiary in Kunshan City, and about 300 employees in this part will also stay in Toshiba Lighting. At present, most of the three companies export most of their products to Japan. In the future, they will be replaced by Toshiba Lighting's domestic base in Japan and external OEMs. Improve its cost competitiveness.
