LED support industry: investment trends still to be broken

A wing of the big bird, due to the slow development of the wings, want to fly high but the heart and the lack of strength. China's LED (light emitting diode) industry is like the big bird, and its upstream equipment and materials support industries like stunted wings. How to better and faster development of equipment and materials industry, so that China's LED industry to fly higher and farther, as a hot topic after the LED application industry.

Hot investment

In January this year, Guangdong, Foshan launched LED chip manufacturing core equipment projects. Reported that the project by Huazhong University of Science and Technology professor Gan Zhiyin led research team developed, and reached a cooperative development agreement with Guangdong Nanhai District of Foshan City, Akinobu group, to proceed with the project prototype and industrialization etc.. The project budget investment of about 500 million yuan, the first phase of investment of $80 million. The picture shows the LIAN LED production line

LED is composed of ultra high purity compound semiconductor materials such as GaN (GAN) made of, its core technology is in the MOCVD (organic chemical vapor deposition furnace, also known in the growth of epitaxial furnace) a layer thickness of only a few microns in compound semiconductor epitaxial wafer. MOCVD is the most important equipment in the production process of LED, epitaxial wafer growth technology is the most critical technology, the value of the whole industry chain (epitaxial wafer, chip, packaging, application) 70%. It is understood that, at present, Suzhou and Beijing are interested in investing in R & D and production of MOCVD equipment. Suzhou Crystal Technology Co., Ltd. Liang Bingwen, chairman, said: the National 863 Program in different periods have been supporting several projects to do MOCVD equipment research and development, but the results of commercialization, commercialization is not ideal. At that time, just do a few samples of MOCVD equipment, did not produce or shipped to make decent MOCVD equipment enterprises. If Beijing, Suzhou or Shenzhen this year launched MOCVD equipment, will not only stay in the research and development stage, but put into commercial operation of real significance. "

Of course, MOCVD and other key equipment is difficult, the general manager of Shenzhen Lee diffuse iron Lehman Photoelectric Technology Co. Ltd., upstream of the MOCVD core equipment is expected to take 3 to 5 years to commercial production. He suggested that domestic equipment needs to further solve the problem of reliability and accuracy, the government should also encourage the purchase of domestic equipment LED incentives to give some of the opportunities for the growth of domestic equipment as a latecomer LED.

In addition to the whole system, we should also attach importance to the manufacturing and supporting capacity of key components. For example, high purity, high quality graphite, crystal material components, surface treatment of stainless steel parts, as well as pressure, flow, temperature detection, a variety of vacuum pumps are essential for MOCVD. Therefore, the successful operation of the MOCVD project will promote the development and progress of a large number of supporting industries. Of course, the success of MOCVD and other key equipment localization means that the cost of LED is reduced. "Liang Bingwen thinks.

Process equipment counterparts

Equipment and technology are not separable, no equipment process must be on paper, no process equipment will be passive water. However, the current domestic equipment manufacturers do not seem to pay particular attention to process problems, it can be said that the process has become one of the main obstacles to promote the use of domestic equipment.

ULVAC (Chinese) company official told reporters: "the equipment and technology are closely linked, just have the right equipment is not enough. Equipment manufacturers can jointly develop the production enterprise, because the equipment manufacturers do not understand the production process, the upstream and downstream cooperation to solve process problems, which is the equipment manufacturers should pay attention to. Domestic equipment manufacturers want to develop, we must listen to the voice of the user. The official said.

There is no denying that if the equipment suppliers can provide equipment at the same time to provide technology, it will have an advantage in the market. Crystal energy photoelectric (Jiangxi) Co., Ltd., director of the Yangtze River wind Yi said in an interview with reporters, there are many other domestic equipment developed, but not in the market to promote the application. The main reason is that the process and equipment are not closely integrated, the lack of technical equipment, users do not dare to use. In addition, the localization of the initial stage of the equipment is not perfect, often a number of minor problems (often not a major problem), if the user's equipment maintenance level can not go on, often do not dare to eat crab. "There is a MOCVD equipment manufacturer in the world, many years ago to develop the production of MOCVD equipment, but they do not have their own epitaxial growth process, so there is almost no user in the market. So, the combination of technology and equipment, the process of materialization into the equipment is how important. "Jiang stressed.

Comprehensive capacity has been improved

With the development of domestic LED industry, the comprehensive capacity has been greatly improved. Anhui Wenrun photoelectric Limited company president Chen Hesheng said, at present, the package and the application of the supporting materials has been relatively complete, including epoxy resin, metal stent and package, mold, silicon wire, aluminum wire, silver glue, heat tape, fixture etc.. In the field of equipment, packaging, welding, solidification, vacuum processing, testing and other aspects have also made great progress, but in the core of the automated assembly is still relatively backward.

Deputy general manager of Xiamen Hualian Electronics Co., Ltd. Ye Likang said in an interview with reporters, at present, solid crystal, key LED package required, glue, glue, tape, oven, test equipment and instrument bracket, aluminum plate, wire, aluminum wire, silver glue, epoxy resin, silica gel