Leotek Electronics Co. is a wholly owned subsidiary of Lite-on Technology Group with over two decades of history in LED Street light and traffic light products development experience in Taiwan. While 2012, Leotek becomes a leading brand in a highly competitive market with world’s famous lighting companies in North America.

Approximately total 200,000 units of Mercury Vapor Street Light will be retrofitted by the end of July since the “LED street lamp expansion project” budget had promoted by Taiwan's Bureau of Energy in 2012. Leotek has successful won some projects from different city to city, (Taipei city, New Taipei city, Tainan city, Nantou , Taidung and Hsinchu Counties).The total quantity of LEDs street light from winning projects of Leotek is up to 46,000 units that based on the result of “Most Advantageous Tender” .It is first applied in Taiwan as a revolution procurement for bidding in LEDs Street light within five years. Based on the new procurement, makers in Taiwan are able to compete by presenting the advantages of products instead of price-bidding tender. Simultaneously, the committee of City Authority can select decent product along with score criteria.

The following is our interview with Leotek’s Chief Operation Officer Mr. David Yeh. During this interview, he talked about Leotek’s LED traffic light/street light development and the company’s vision.

1. What is Leotek’s company vision?

Become the world’s leading LED Street light and traffic light manufacturer based on Taiwan Technology.

2. What kind of strategy will Leotek apply in order to become the world’s leading LED manufacturer?

Focus and differentiation are two major strategies which applying in Leotek product and technology development. According to our successful experiences in North America, to establish Technical barriers of LEDs lighting products should be consolidating several factors, such as optics, mechanism, electricity and heat management. All factors should be considered from the application level, the end-user’s point of view.     

(1.) Focus strategy

To maximize the product category and models by limited resource, we have totally forty percent of colleague are sophistic R&D engineers, most of they have 10 years of experiences and understanding customer needs. We believe to focus on product development can bring up higher reliability and durability under harsh environment to obtain well branding reputation in North America.    

(2) Differentiation

Through powerful R&D integration capability, we can create differentiation for local market requirements. For examples, for roadway lighting, we can offer 15 of verity beam spreads of lens to adopt different lighting designs along with low glare and zero light pollution. In order to build up strong core competence, Leotek will investigate market requirements for pursuing higher cost and performance LEDs street lights.    

3. What are Leotke’s key success factors in North America?

The US has strict standards for street lights. Leotek’s professional R&D and engineering team has designed street lights according to different areas, and after installation, They conducted field luminance measurements in order to further understand customers’ needs. Moreover, They have designed low-glare lights and other reliable lighting products to meet pedestrian’s and driver’s needs. Also, cooperated with local dealers. Leotek’s worldwide shipment in 2013 is expected to increase by 45%. 

Since the US traffic lighting market is almost fully developed, how to enhance product differentiation has also become our focus. It is expected that in 2013, our revenue will grow by 15%-20%. 

4. Does Leotek have any suggestions for the Taiwanese government regarding their LED street light policy?

Taiwan’s LED street lighting is still in the initial stages, thus support by the government is necessary. In order to build up excellent firms to compete with the world’s giants, our government should assist corporations to develop technology in Taiwan. Eventually, most of LEDs buyers will consider Made in Taiwan is their first choice.  

We agreed that Taiwan’s advantageous tender for the LEDs ESCO project, though complicated,however, it can keep market health and avoiding the price competition.

User pay is also important to the LED street lighting market development. The government should show their determination in assisting new industries and guiding them towards to positive cycle (advantageous tender) instead of the negative cycle (price bids).

The government should support companies for promoting LED lighting business. Once the advantageous tender becomes regular bids, the Taiwanese LED street lights could be more innovative instead of matching the minimum standards. By then, the Taiwanese street light makers would have first step become world class LED street light manufacturers toward to globalization.

We believe that after this local market transformation, Leotek (MIT) equals LEDs street light will be the first image when people considering of LED street lights.

Photos: LED street lights being installed in western Taipei