As an important part that influences the reliability of LED lighting fixtures, LED driver’s quality and stability are pivotal to the lifespan of the whole lamp. In recent years, as the LED lighting industry entered a mature period of stability, LED driver manufacturers started to seek breakthroughs and innovation. Rising of niche markets has brought new business opportunities to the LED driver industry, leading to another round of competition. Meanwhile, ever-changing market environment has presented new difficulties and challenges to the industry, making manufacturers rethink their company development strategies.

Recently, LEDinside had the pleasure to interview Martin Ma, CEO of Shenzhen Wei Peng Shiji Technology (WeledPower), who kindly shared the experience of independently developing LED driver for ten years and discussed future development of the LED driver industry under an unpredictable market environment.

Martin Ma, CEO of WeledPower

Focusing on LED Lighting Industry, WeledPower Aims to Build its Own LED Driver Brand

Founded in 2008, WeledPower has been committed to building a global leading brand of LED driver. Under the operating strategy of maintaining innovative spirit, offering remarkable product quality and excellent services as well as creating values for clients, WeledPower has gained good reputation and brand recognition in the international market. The company possesses 400 workers, of which 50 are R&D staffs, and the core research persons boast extensive working experience in well-known LED driver industry and strong ability of technological innovation. In addition, WeledPower owns a series of advanced manufacturing equipment, such as SMT machine, ATE, PCB, ageing rack and laser engraving machine, and it has independent and standard test lab for high/low temperature test, salt spray test, surge test, and more. In the course of development, WeledPower has acquired ISO900 quality system certification issued by SGS UK and its products have passed professional certification including UL, cUL, TUV, CE, PSE, SAA, ENEC and CCC.

(Image: WeledPower)

According to Ma, LED lighting industry was flourishing when WeledPower established. With an insight into development trend of the industry, the company’s founders seized an opportunity to enter the promising LED driver market. By virtue of an earnest attitude and the joint efforts of all WeledPower's people, the company soon gained a foothold in the industry. Since its establishment, WedledPower was dedicated to the LED lighting industry in constant pursuit of new profit engines, and gradually, WeledPower brand got established in the global market.

(Image: WeledPower)

Up till now, WeledPower is possessed of a mature and standard product line, covering on-off LED driver, 0-10V dimming LED driver, emergency LED driver, programmable LED driver, UFO LED driver and LED module. Besides, it also provides professional OEM and ODM services. Presently, its products mainly target famous indoor and outdoor lamps in North American market and its standard LED drivers with high cost performance have won recognition from customers. By far, WeledPower’s production capacity has surpassed 1,000,000 sets per month and it will continue to expand production according to market demand in the upcoming future.

(Image: WeledPower)

In the early stage of development, LED driver market was burgeoning while products varied considerably in quality. Despite weak technological strength and a lack of talent at that time, WeledPower quickly got a good reputation and established brand recognition followed by three to four years of R&D investment, sustainable innovation and technology accumulation. Gradually, WeledPower enhanced its comprehensive strength and expanded client base, and as a result, it rose to a leading company in LED driver industry.

Brand Core Competitiveness Lies in Expertise, Foresightedness and Cohesion

Due to low threshold of indoor LED driver, WeledPower decided to enter indoor application market in the first place and then made inroads into outdoor market. Currently, the company’s indoor and outdoor LED driver revenues respectively account for 50% of its total revenue. In terms of differences between indoor and outdoor LED drivers, Martin explained that they differ in standards. For instance, outdoor LED driver has higher requirements on temperature, reliability, surge protection and lighting protection, and others.

At present, indoor LED driver market competition has become ferocious. According to Ma, the competition mainly occurs from the possibility of reducing cost due to standard upgrade. Yet, WeledPower has outstanding advantages in this regard. As its LED drivers feature programmable functions, WeledPower adopts scale production pattern and improves production efficiency by over 50%, greatly reducing material and labor costs as well as shortening product delivery time. Therefore, WeledPower can still stands out with popular products and is capable of developing new customers amid serious market competition.

(Image: WeledPower)

In outdoor LED driver market, WeledPower’s high-quality products also lead the market in North America. Martin pointed out that outdoor LED driver has high technical threshold because of the complexity in selecting circuit; particularly, various regions make different standards and requirements on LED driver, so company’s expertise and cost performance of products are highly required. WeledPower has been devoted to taping the North American market and maintained close cooperation and links with its clients. It is in a position to develop targeted products with price competitiveness. Compared with other rivals, WeledPower’s outdoor products are so competitive that they can continue to create values for customers and preserve brand vitality.

In both indoor and outdoor LED driver markets, the core competitiveness of WeledPower brand consists in expertise and foresightedness. On the one hand, WeledPower’s systematic quality control system covers the whole process, including the research and development, samples verification, trial production, suppliers selection and management, raw material purchase, production progress control, finished products quality control, and after-sales service. Additionally, it owns a strong R&D team with tremendous technical strength and UL standard test lab and more than 20 kinds of professional machines. All products are tested by strict R&D process before manufacturing. Besides, production rigorously follows ISO9001:2015 System with 100% quality check in several procedures and sampling test for each carton. As a whole, WeledPower’s lean production management contributes to premium products. On the other hand, although the DLC and UL standards in North America keep changing and products update frequently, WeledPower can quickly response to change and identify new market demands. On this basis, it will upgrade existing products or launch new products in time.

(Image: WeledPower)

On top of that, WeledPowe’s success also relies on cohesion. The company highlights the importance of R&D investment and personnel training. More than 10% of its general revenue is invested on research and development each year, which well reflects its advanced idea and innovative thinking as a national high-tech enterprise. In respect of personnel training, WeledPower grows together with its staffs. It holds weekly training class and all of them can share working skills and personal career planning. Moreover, the company allocates funds for learning opportunities in a bid to create values for WeledPower’s people and build a cohesive team.

WeledPower will Actively Embrace Change and Develop toward the Direction of Perfect Cost Control and Product Diversification

Integrated LED driver and Free of LED driver have become new trends of the industry. Does this pose a threat to LED driver industry? From the perspective of Ma, these trends mainly have an influence on light source products. Integrated LED driver and free of LED driver solutions will not take the place of existing LED driver solution in the next 10 years. Especially for outdoor applications, they still fail to meet the requirements including product specifications and reliability.

Ma said that WeledPower will develop toward the direction of perfect cost control. It intends to realize perfect cost control by R&D design and machine automation. Specifically, it will enhance R&D strength and improve manufacturing process to reduce cost. He believed that comprehensive and well-regulated management can also make a vast difference.

In light of the current market situation and industry trend, WeledPower is all set to expand its product line. The COVID-19 outbreak has sparked new thoughts in LED driver industry. E-commerce channel bucks the trend while traditional channel falls into a quagmire. Thereby, based on the North American market, WeledPower will expand upscale products in the European market with rich technical reserve. Concurrently, as online e-commerce sales model is in vogue, WeledPower plans to develop products for terminal customers. With diversified products in response to market change, WeledPower will proactively explore new applications and channels, keeping abreast of the times.

Currently, WeledPower’s revenue size has exceeded RMB 150 million (US$ 21.19 million). Looking forward, the company will remain confident in LED driver industry and its total sales is expected to reach around RMB 500 million (US$ 70.63 million) by 2024. In the future, WeledPower will embrace change, advance with the times and constantly pursue innovation so as to achieve a win-win situation with its clients.

（Author：LEDinside Janice）