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Competition drives down price of white LEDs

White LEDs used in mobile phones for screen and keypad backlighting have plummeted in price as competition between manufacturers grows.

The price of white LEDs has dropped by 8% per unit since December 2003, according to a report in the Nihon Keizai Shimbun Japan-based newspaper.

It says that the price charged to large-lot users by manufacturers Nichia, Toyoda Gosei and others now stands at just 54 yen ($0.49) per unit.

Until recently, it was Nichia that dominated this market, but with increased competition from other producers in Asia, the price of devices has been forced down.

The fall in prices should see the uptake of white LEDs in mobile phones increase even more rapidly. The pattern follows a similar drop that has been witnessed in the price of blue LEDs used for similar applications in phone handsets over the past year.

At the recent Strategies in Light conference, Jong-Je Jung, director of the optoelectronic department of South Korean LED manufacturer LG Innotek, said that the price of blue LEDs for keypad backlights in phones had dropped from $0.24 per device in the first quarter of 2003 to just $0.11 by the end of the year.

Jung added that in China, the price of a blue LED had dropped to just $0.07.

Uptake of white LEDs in the mobile market is expected to be further driven by the increasing market share of camera-equipped phone handsets. High-brightness white LEDs are required for the “flash” component of the camera.

Jung estimates that 95% of new phones sold in Japan will be camera-equipped this year. While the proportion is lower in other geographic regions, Jung said that the total world market for camera-equipped phones is expected to grow rapidly from 78 million units in 2003 to reach 205 million units in 2006.

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