Horticultural lighting is hot, global LED companies have entered the market

Due to the impact of global climate change and urbanization on traditional agriculture, the demand for LED greenhouse lighting for global greenhouses is on the rise.

Although blue and red LED horticultural lighting has been used in the cultivation of green leafy vegetables, seed germination or flowering, the best spectrum required by LED chip manufacturers, lighting manufacturers and plantations for each plant has not yet been applied. A consensus is reached because different varieties have different growth cycles and require different growth conditions. Therefore, LED horticultural lighting solutions are very diverse in terms of spectral formulation.

In 2017, Signify (renamed Philips Lighting) partnered with Agro-Inwest, Russia‘s largest vegetable grower, to take over the world‘s largest LED horticultural lighting project. In 2018, the two sides will expand the greenhouse area with LED horticultural lighting from 25 hectares to 68.5 hectares.

Osram Licht also took advantage of its advantages in the field of lighting sources, and acquired the company including the German vertical agricultural developer Agrilution and the American LED gardening lighting developer Fluence Bioengineering, entering the field of LED horticultural lighting.

GE announced a new LED lighting vertical farm project in the UK to provide linear Arize horticultural lighting for the farm by its Current company. The project is expected to begin production of vegetables in the third quarter of 2018, with annual production expected to increase to 420 metric tons.

South Korea‘s LG Innotek also announced that it has entered the horticultural LED market, and in early July 2018 launched 30 LED horticultural lighting products, including UV LED lights. These 30 LED gardening lighting products vary in illumination angle, spectral wavelength and illumination quality.

Foxconn also transformed an old factory in China into a plant factory with a plant area of ​​over 5,000 square meters. The plant claims to be the world‘s largest factory with a 14-story cultivation rack with LED lighting and hydroponic liquids that can grow 2.5 tons of vegetables a day. The plant‘s production conditioning, hydroponic liquid supply, and harvesting are all automated. In addition, Foxconn will establish a database to collect plant growth data and environmental parameters from the plant to replicate the model to other plant plants and provide a reference for operators of small and medium plant plants.

Japan-based Nichia Chemical also invested nearly 2 billion yen (about 18 million US dollars) to set up a factory in the R&D center in Shanghai, China, for the development of vegetables and Chinese herbal medicine. Mitsubishi Chemical and online shopping operator JD.com has also established a vegetable plantation in China; LED epitaxial wafer and chip manufacturer Sanan Optoelectronics and the Institute of Botany of the Chinese Academy of Sciences have established a joint venture - Fujian Zhongke Biotech Co., Ltd. Together to build the Zhongke Sanan plant factory. Currently, there are about 300 companies operating in China, with 50% in the South and 30% in the East.

Taiwan‘s LED epitaxial wafer and chip maker Jingyuan Optoelectronics said that the number of horticultural lighting LED chip customers has increased to 5-6, and the corresponding revenue in 2018 will also increase by nearly 50%.