Guangdong LED "popularization" upgrade look for breakout

As a big province and a major exporter, a cold trade of new trade technical barriers is blowing into the LED industry in Guangdong. In accordance with the new standards, the energy efficiency requirements for the export of LED products have increased by 2.5 times. The sudden increase in technology threshold will significantly increase the production costs of LED companies.

Faced with the sudden crisis, Guangdong's leading LED leading companies have actively researched related policies and international industry standards in recent days and updated the company's product technical indicators. Experts pointed out that the introduction of higher technical standards abroad is the development trend of the industry. In the short term, it will cause certain cost pressures for domestic LED companies. However, in the long run, the improvement of the technological level will change the status quo of the "civilian" industry and help increase the competitiveness of the domestic LED industry.

The cost increase is more than 20%. "At present, some trade and technology policies for the LED industry issued by Europe and the United States still remain at the level of the government. They have not been issued and implemented in the company. This is a global standard. It needs to wait until the specific operation plan and the inspection process. After the relevant indicators have come out, the company can take relevant measures in a targeted manner.

According to the EU, the United States, Chile, Uganda and other countries on the TBT notification LED lamps, the EU on the directional lights and LED lights put forward high energy efficiency requirements, requiring only the energy efficiency index of 0.2 or more directional LED lamps and directional fluorescent lamps can enter the EU market, Compared with previous energy efficiency requirements, it has increased 2.5 times, which is 2.2 times that of China's national standards. This will directly lead to an increase in the production cost of LED lamps by more than 20%.

In this regard, GF Securities electronic industry researcher pointed out that the 0.2 energy efficiency index proposed by foreign countries, domestic companies have not applied relevant index standards in this area. There are many LED product indices, including luminous efficiency, color rendering, and environmental protection requirements. It is necessary to further clarify how this indicator is determined abroad. However, at present, there is not a great technical problem. As long as the use of foreign high-quality chips and matching modules, it is not difficult to meet international standards, but the product cost will increase accordingly.

Wei Li pointed out that judging from the current situation, the company has accumulated strong technical research and development capabilities over the years. Products can not only meet international standards, but also exceed international standards. Therefore, it should be no problem to meet the internationally required energy efficiency index of 0.2. .

"For international business, the company has set up an international business department to conduct product design and production according to the corresponding access standards. At the same time, the company will also conduct foreign trade through innovation in business models, such as cooperation with foreign local companies. The company sells its modules to foreign companies, provides solutions for foreign companies, and assembles foreign companies for final assembly. 90% of this product is manufactured by Asahi Photonics, but the GDP of the product stays in foreign countries, achieving domestic The win-win situation between enterprises and foreign governments," said Wei Li.

High barriers bring new opportunities New regulations The requirements for conformity assessment and market supervision inspection procedures for directional lamps and LED luminaires in the country of entry are increasingly stringent, and will bring huge testing cost to the company. Such as the United States reported the LED test program, according to preliminary estimates, an enterprise if required with the appropriate testing laboratories and testing equipment, you need to spend about 350,000 yuan, but also in the laboratory every year, equipment maintenance and experiment In terms of remuneration, room personnel pay about 100,000 expenses.

Data show that in 2011, the LED output value of Guangdong Province reached 150 billion yuan, accounting for about 70% of the country, 50% of the world, and it is growing at a rate that doubles every year. The United States and the European Union are major importers of LED products in Guangdong Province. In 2011, the export sales of LED lamps in Guangdong exceeded RMB 34 billion, which is more than 20% higher than that in 2010, accounting for almost one-fourth of the total output value of LED lamps in Guangdong. Among them, exports to the United States and the European Union amounted to approximately 22 billion yuan, accounting for about two-thirds of the export value of LED lamps in Guangdong, and accounting for 15% of the total output value of LED lamps in Guangdong.

At present, there are more than 3,000 LED companies in Guangdong Province, and most of their products are exported to the United States. The LED test procedure announced by the United States alone will bring additional costs of more than 2 billion yuan to LED export enterprises in Guangdong Province, which will greatly reduce the competitiveness of Guangdong LED lighting products in the US market.

However, GF Securities researchers are still optimistic about the new regulations. “Since most of the foreign LED products are also in the form of domestic OEMs, domestic companies can also pass some of the rising costs abroad.”

National Star high-level optoelectronics said that in accordance with the new regulations, “If an enterprise is equipped with appropriate testing laboratories and testing equipment as required, it will need to spend about 350,000 yuan.” If the testing cost of 350,000 yuan is once and for all, then the LED export enterprises It's not a bad thing.

Some companies even regard the promotion of industry standards as an opportunity for development. Hongli Optoelectronics executives also stated that the company has always attached great importance to product performance and quality. The higher the threshold, the more opportunities the company has. The company's export products are mainly European and American international markets, and have always been in accordance with the latest standards in Europe and the United States for export products R & D and production, such as the new UL official release 1598C standard was upgraded on July 16, the company is in accordance with new standards for product upgrades, and Send the test again.

He pointed out that from a performance perspective, LED itself is an energy-saving product. At present, the company's products are in line with the relevant new standards in the world today, including UL, TUV, CE, CCC, light source products also have passed the American Energy Star LM-80 test.

Actively responding to trade barriers In order to actively respond to the multinational new trade technical barriers in Europe and America, it has a major impact on the export of LED products in Guangdong Province. Recently, the representatives from the United Nations Lighting Quality Inspection Center (Guangdong) of the Quality Supervision Bureau of Guangdong Province and the representatives of 15 LED lighting leading enterprises from Guangdong Province held a national TBT notification committee in Zhongshan to conduct research on TBT notifications related to LED lamps and lanterns in many countries in Europe and America. Comment and propose countermeasures.

In terms of external coordination, participating experts suggested using the coordination mechanism under the WTO/TBT Agreement to promote the adoption of comments from Guangdong and other countries. For example, the United States is required to refer to the current practices of IEC and other WTO member states to simplify the requirements for the test environment and test methods, reduce the number of test samples and the number of tests, and shorten the length of tests to reduce the product testing brought about by LED lighting manufacturers. The burden is to avoid unnecessary trade barriers for the entry of foreign LED lighting products into the U.S. market; the EU is required to appropriately reduce the minimum energy efficiency requirements for directional and LED lamps, and postpone the implementation time of this requirement by more than one year. So that companies can better adapt to the changes brought about by the regulations.

It is reported that these opinions have been reported directly to countries such as Europe and the United States. Once adopted by countries in Europe, America, etc., they will directly recover about 4 billion yuan in losses for Guang LED export enterprises and play an important role in the export of LED lamps and the healthy development of LED industry in Guangdong. The role of promotion.

Against the ever-increasing technical barriers to trade in Europe and the United States, the government should increase its efforts to implement policies and financial support for dealing with technical barriers to foreign trade. In particular, increase investment in R&D of LED core technologies. By strengthening the collection of information on foreign trade barriers in LED trades and technical research, we will develop LED technology with independent intellectual property rights, and independently produce LED products that are highly efficient, energy-saving, and environmentally friendly, gradually breaking the monopoly of foreign technologies and cracking off foreign technical barriers.

In the industry, LED companies should establish a joint technical response to technical barriers to trade, provide TBT point-to-point technical services, and actively provide LED companies with technical knowledge of trade barriers training services and information consulting services. At the same time, with reference to the latest practices of developed countries such as Europe and the United States, international standards and foreign advanced standards have been converted into local standards in Guangdong Province, and a LED product standard system has been established in line with international standards.

Prior to this, Guangdong Province has taken the lead in launching the "Guangdong Province LED Industry Development Technology Roadmap" and implemented the "Church of a Thousand and a Thousand Miles" LED street lamp application demonstration project to guide more than 10 universities and research institutes in the field of LED lighting in China. More than 20 leading LED companies in the province set up Guangdong Semiconductor Lighting Engineering and Research Innovation Alliance, and released the Guangdong Provincial LED lighting product benchmark index.

“Now Guangdong Province is implementing a product benchmarking system, which is in line with the current international situation. A variety of products of the company have passed the test and evaluation of the system,” said senior management of Hongli Optoelectronics.