Compal expects slow adoption of LED lighting source in notebooks

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Ray Chen, president of Compal Electronics, yesterday said volume shipments of LED-based notebooks will not arrive until the second half of 2008 with the application to be seen in only select models.

Compal is now only at a trial stage for LED-based notebooks, with the amount of output at a very limited level, Chen indicated. Nevertheless, the company is confident of the trend of a shift for panel backlighting source from CCFL (cold cathode fluorescent lamp) to LED for notebooks, with LED backlighting able to offer advantages such as reduction in thickness and power consumption, Chen said.

For LED backlights, sub-12.1-inch notebooks and even some 14.1-inch ones have started using the technology. Therefore, Compal expects a more prevalent use of LED as the backlighting source for notebook panels to arrive during 2008-2009, Chen detailed.

Due to cost issues, the penetration speed of LED as a backlight source for large-size panels has not been as fast as expected.

Taiwan's Photonics Industry & Technology Development Association (PIDA) recently said the penetration rates in the 10- to 12-inch notebook panel segments will reach 10% in 2007. For larger-size notebook panels, LED backlighting still faces barriers, with the most important one being cost competitiveness, PIDA noted.

DisplaySearch said during a speech at the recent BLUE 2007 solid state lighting suppliers conference that the penetration rate for LED-based notebooks will not exceed 10% until 2010 (around 11.4%), compared to 1.1% in 2006, 4.2% in 2007 and 7.6% in 2008.

Chen spoke at an investors conference for Compal's first-quarter results. At the occasion, Chen said Compal will achieve its shipment goal of 20 million notebooks for 2007, up at least 38% compared to 2006. The company posted revenues of NT$96.98 billion (US$2.92 billion) for the first quarter, down 6% sequentially, but up 63% on-year.