red lasers industry
September 2010 Kodak demonstrated a laser-based cinema projector. The Film Distributor’s Association has approved this for use in the US. Kodak has decided that it will not manufacture this product in-house, and is planning to license its technology to interested parties. Meanwhile, the Chinese firm Beijing Phoebus Vision has announced that it has developed laser-based cinema projection systems for domestic use. This company showcased a laser projector demonstrator during the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics.
Depending on the size of the screen, lasers used for cinema projection must produce between 50 W and 200 W of total power for each colour. Such a high output power is challenging to deliver from a reliable source. That’s because it is much more difficult to manufacture visible lasers than their infrared cousins that have a far higher wall plug efficiency and are used in industrial applications.
However, the good news is that in cinemas, lasers are deployed in a controlled environment and do not require a wide operating temperature range and a demanding consumer product design. Instead, these systems can be built in an industrial manner. Currently, key players in cinema projection are planning strategies for this market and designing prototypes.
Tapping into the emerging markets We believe that we are well placed to make inroads into the emerging market for laser-based displays, and we have already gained traction in the more established market for medical lasers. Our product portfolio spans laser die to turnkey systems, which are all part of the Sparklight product platform. We have also had success with our ChiliLase red laser diode family, a range that goes from 500 mW single-emitter chips to 12 W fiber- coupled laser modules and systems. These products that were launched in 2007 have already won adoption in medical and industrial applications, including ‘design- ins’ to major OEMs such as PerkinElmer.
In the last few years, our ChiliLase products have attracted the attention of the display market, which places a very high value on reliable, high-power visible lasers. In late 2009 we started supplying 500 mW, 635 nm lasers to Asia for deployment in displays, and last year we shipped more than 5000 Watts of ChiliLase products for this application.
The rapid adoption of these lasers has spurred us to further invest in the development of red lasers for displays. We are particularly keen to target multiWatt (>50 W per color) visible lasers for digital cinema projectors. Such laser systems at visible wavelengths are not commercially available, and we aim to change this, eventually bringing complete laser engines to this market that are based on our Sparklight laser system platform.
August / September 2011
www.compoundsemiconductor.net 31
We anticipate that the business opportunity for red laser diode manufacture in cinema projectors will be at least $50-100 million over the next five-to-seven years. Additional sales for red lasers emitting 1 W or more will come from laser-TV and business-scale projectors and laser shows. Thanks to our in-house chip technology and system integration capability, we believe that we are in an excellent position to capitalize on this opportunity in the coming years. In fact, it would be fair to say that we see our future shining bright in the red dawn of the era of new display applications.
© 2011 Angel Business Communications. Permission required.
Modulight produces its red lasers in-house
Modulight’s fab in Tampere, Finland
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