Taiwan’s light-emitting diode (LED) packaging services providers saw their sales in China edge lower last year amid rising competition from their Chinese counterparts, according to a research report.
Sales in China were also affected by the continued growth of global brands, such as Japan’s Nichia Corp, Cree Inc of the US, Philips of the Netherlands and South Korea’s Seoul Semiconductor Co, said LEDinside, a research unit of Taipei-based market advisory firm TrendForce Corp (集邦科技).
Everlight Electronics Inc (億光) ranked as the biggest Taiwanese LED services provider in China’s US$7.2 billion LED packaging market and the second-biggest supplier overall, trailing only Nichia, the report said.
The nation’s LED packaging firms had sales of US$640 million in China last year, down 1 percent from a year earlier.
However, Chinese vendors’ revenues in their home market rose 15 percent year-on-year to US$4.5 billion, while international brands saw their sales grow 40 percent to US$2 billion.
Taiwan’s Lextar Electronics Corp (隆達電子) and Unity Opto Technology Co (東貝光電) gained footholds in China’s market last year, but only Everlight was among the top 10 suppliers in the market.
Four Chinese vendors, including Foshan Nationstar Optoelectronics Co (佛山國星光電) and Shenzhen Jufei Optoelectronics Co (深圳市聚飛光電), made it into the top 10, along with one firm each from the US, Japan and the Netherlands, and two from South Korea, LEDinside said.
The top 10 vendors accounted for 43.6 percent of all sales in China’s LED packaging market last year, LEDinside said.
LEDinside analyst Yu Bin (余彬) said China was a late entrant to the LED packaging business, lagging behind other countries in building patent portfolios, but Chinese authorities have supported the industry to help it catch up with rivals.
Among the Chinese government’s strategies is accelerating the development of domestic LED chip production, which would create business for local LED packaging firms and help them grow.
Chinese vendors are also upgrading their technology, strengthening their competitive edge.
International brands that have maintained their lead over their peers in China are expected to continue to set up production bases there, Yu said.
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