INDUSTRY LEDs Replacing
halogen lamps
Inferior light quality holds back the sales of most LED-based replacements for halogen lamps in casinos, hotels, high-end retailers and cruise ships. But that’s not the case for Soraa’s lighting products, which produce full-spectrum emission with a violet LED pumping red, green and blue phosphors. Richard Stevenson reports.
A FEW YEARS AGO, the lighting industry debated whether there would be a revolution in solid-state lighting. Now, however, it’s not a question of it but when.
For chipmakers, this revolution can’t come to soon. They are operating in a market suffering from over capacity, and shipments to light bulb makers offer the opportunity for higher margins and increased sales.
Many LED makers are now working hard to forge strong relationships with lamp makers, so that as sales of solid-state lamps surge, so do their own chip revenues. But this is not the only road to success, and a few other firms are taking a different path – one that allows them to take far greater control of their own destiny. Companies that fall into this category include Cree, which has diversified from being an LED manufacturer to a maker of replacements for 40 W and 60 W incandescents, and Soraa, a start-up based in Goleta, CA, that has developed a novel chip that features in its solid-state replacement for 50- 75 W halogen lamps.
Soraa is by no means the only maker of an LED- based replacement for the halogen lamp. But its product has a far higher colour quality than that produced many of its rivals – it has a colour- rendering index (CRI) of 95, compared to a typical value of 80 – and that should ensure success in this market.
“We see our customers as those that have refused to consider LEDs in the past,” reveals Chief Operating Officer Douglas Devine. “They have refused to move away from the halogen, because saving a couple of bucks in the electricity bill isn’t worth damaging the ambience of the customer- facing areas that they have spent so much time and effort on.”
In May 2012, Soraa launched its full-colour MR16s that are wining deployment in businesses measuring revenue-per-square- foot, such as
high-end retailers, casinos, cruise ships and hotels. “These are areas where they
The Soraa SNAP System combines a unique 10 degree lamp with an innovative array of interchangeable beam and colour-shifting accessories
August / September 2013
www.compoundsemiconductor.net 27
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