Seoul Semiconductor, a leader in LED technology, announced that it will increase the global automotive LED market share by strengthening its high efficient and high reliable LED product line-up for the automotive application on May 28, 2015.

ON World’s recently completed survey with 1,000+ U.S. online adult consumers found that smart lighting is the most popular home automation product area with 1 in 5 likely to purchase a smart LED light bulb within the next two years.

Royal Philips, the global leader in lighting, announces today the world’s first major install of its connected lighting system with LED-based indoor positioning for Carrefour, the leading retailer in Europe and the third-largest in the world. The newly refurbished Carrefour hypermarket in Lille, France has replaced its previous fluorescent lighting with 2.5 kilometers of energy efficient Philips LED lighting that uses light to transmit a location signal to a shopper’s smartphone, triggering an app to provide location-based services.

LEDinside was covering one of the largest LED tradeshows in Southeast Asia, LED Expo Thailand 2015 last week, and there will be more upcoming articles on the show and market trends this week.

When Chris Bajuk, founder and CEO of the urban farming company "Urban Harvest" enters the production halls of his vegetable crop business in the mornings, he sees hundreds of square meters of sprightly growing lettuce heads. What's special: Bajuk isn't standing in giant greenhouses set in a rural atmosphere, but in the center of the million-strong U.S. metropolis of Seattle.

Apple recently announced it will be launching Apple HomeKit devices next month, denying a previous Fortune report that pushed back the release date to fall, according to several tech and business media reports.

Shopping in a big department store can quickly devolve from a simple errand to an odyssey filled with frustration. What section do they put the bath towels in again? Is there a route to take that avoids the chemical attack of the perfume aisle on the way to kitchenware? Where do they put the on-sale jackets?

Sony is expanding its Life Space UX product series this month in Japan with the launch of a new Bluetooth speaker LED bulb.

The intelligent lighting system of the future will make its premiere in the new Opel Astra generation at the International Motor Show in Frankfurt (September 17 to 27, 2015). With the new Astra, the ground-breaking full-LED matrix light IntelliLux that enables driving with glare-free high beams will be available in the compact class for the first time, making top-of-the-range lighting technology accessible to the largest audience ever. After having introduced bi-xenon adaptive lighting in the current generation Astra, Opel again takes on a pioneering role in lighting technology with its next compact bestseller.

Dialight announced the launch of it’s next-generation DuroSite® LED Conveyor Light. The fitting is designed specifically to eliminate lighting maintenance in the harsh environment of mining applications, where maintenance of thousands of light fittings installed on kilometers (km) of conveyors and walkways across vast sites is an expensive and ongoing burden. 

The Noida Authority in the National Capital Region plans to upgrade streetlights with energy efficient LED bulbs to cut down electricity and maintenance costs, reported The Times of India.

To make bikers more visible on streets during night time, two Canadian designers have come up with a creative LED rear bike light design that literally requires bikers with “some balls” to mount on a bike seat.

With the current lumen boost of many tier 1 LED manufacturers, the demand raised exponentially for ultra-low profile LED coolers for use in height restricted down light applications.

According to a new market report published by Transparency Market Research “Smart Lighting Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends and Forecast, 2014 - 2020,” global smart lightning market was valued at US$  21 billion in 2013, growing at a CAGR of 15.9% from 2014 to 2020 to account for US$  56.62 billion in 2020.

Providing a distinct aesthetic advantage, LEDs are allowing designers to reinvent lamps and light itself in ways that once seemed impossible. The innumerable benefits of LED lights in terms of energy-efficiency, environment-friendliness, cost-saving, zero UV emissions and design flexibility opens new opportunities for architects & interior designers, urban, town and smart city planners, project management consultants, building contractors and Lighting engineers. The technological potential of LEDs is only beginning to be realized and with the right blend can provide designers and town planners the flexibility to adjust and adapt the ambiance of indoor, outdoor, commercial and residential spaces with minimal energy consumption.

Europe and Asia have been driving advanced automotive LED lighting developments, while the technology has been slow to pick up in the U.S., due to more stringent legal requirements, reported New York Times.

Towards the end of 2014, Home Depot started to offer several Acuity Brands OLED luminaries, with prices starting at US $199. This was exciting - as these are the cheapest OLED lamps ever, and it is the first time OLEDs are offered at a major retail channel.

On the occasion of the forthcoming World Fair, Milan has taken the decision to become the first major Italian city to upgrade its road lighting to LED technology. The majority of over 140,000 luminaires were produced by the Italian luminaire manufacturer AEC Illuminazione and are equipped with the modern Optotronic 3DIM light management system from Osram. The new installation consumes less than half the power of the previous solution. “We're proud to accompany the city of Milan on its path towards an energy-efficient future with our pioneering technologies,” said a highly pleased Geert van der Meer, CEO of the LED Lamps & Systems business unit at Osram.

China’s “One Belt, One Road” policies spurred Lumileds to construct a new LED autmotive bulb production line, reported National Business Daily.

GE announced today that in partnership with Iwasaki Electric Co. Ltd, the two companies will provide a stronger Lighting product portfolio to address the needs of the Organizing Committee in conjunction with the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. 

The judge’s final verdict will probably be based on Michigan Federal jury findings that two Nichia patents were invalid in the case against Everlight, said former Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) researcher Jerry Yu.

Taiwanese display manufacturer AUO has become Apple’s smartphone screen supplier for the upcoming iPhone 7c, reported UDN.

Veeco Instruments announced today that the University of Cambridge, one of the most highly regarded research universities in the world, has ordered thePropel™ Power Gallium Nitride (GaN) Metal Organic Chemical Vapor Deposition (MOCVD) System for GaN-on-silicon (Si) power electronics and light emitting diode (LED) research and development.

LEDforum 2015 in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China is less than 60 days away! If the LED industry’s performance in 2014 was extraordinary, than 2015 will be glorious. LEDinside estimates that the global LED lighting market will reach $25.7 billion dollars and its market penetration will increase 31% in 2015, while the overall lighting market is projected to grow to $82.1 billion.

Most LED manufacturers were displaying UV or IR LED related applications at SPIE Photonics West, and many of these new applications covered LED chips, dies, package and other products.

Two years ago, Apple CEO Tim Cook deemed OLED screens color saturation as “awful,” and lauded Retina display resolution and color performance as far superior, but this all might be changing for the company’s future iPads.

OLED taillights BMW showcased in its conceptual M4 car model at CES 2015 will be making its way to new BMW M series cars by 2016, according to latest market rumors.

STG Aerospace, a world leader in pioneering aircraft lighting technologies, is delighted to announce that its safTglo® photoluminescent emergency floorpath marking system has been chosen by Shanghai Airlines as a replacement for the combination of electrical and photoluminescent lighting systems previously installed in its fleet of Boeing 767s. Four of the airline’s seven-strong fleet have now been retrofitted with safTglo®.

Top automotive lighting manufacturers gave LEDinside team some insight about the market outlook and challenges at the 31st Taipei International Auto Parts and Accessories Show (Taipei AMPA), which ran from April 8-11, 2015 at TWTC Nangang Exhibition Hall and TWTC Exhibition Hall 1 Area A in Taiwan.

STG Aerospace, a pioneer in aircraft lighting technologies, is delighted to announce that it has established an official presence in China with the launch of a Wholly Foreign Owned Enterprise (WFOE), STG Aerospace (China) Co., Ltd. based in Shanghai. This new initiative is a reflection of the importance of China as a market for STG Aerospace. According to a recent IATA report, the country is expected to overtake the United States as the world’s largest air passenger market by 2030.