James Delahunty
8 Mar 2010 19:42
iSuppli has issued a warning to manufacturers of LCD televisions about an upcoming shortage of LEDs, which are used for backlighting of some LCD televisions. LEDs provide a much better video imagery for viewers when used in LCD TVs, compared to LCD TVs that utilize fluorescent lamps for backlighting.
LCD televisions generally required between 300 and 500 LEDs per panel, all producing a uniform level of brightness. This makes the sector much more vulnerable to an LED shortage than notebook makers for example, as notebooks generally use about 50 LEDs in LCD screens.
Due to the popularity of LED-backlit LCD televisions, consumption of LEDs rose from 57 billion units in 2008 to 63 billion in 2008. iSuppli expects it to reach 104 billion by 2011, while current industry capacity is about 75 billion units.
Unless LED fabrication plants are built rapidly, or manufacturers figure out how to reduce the number of LEDs required in an LCD television whilst not compromising on picture quality, iSuppli predicts that the industry will have to deal with a "drastic under-supply" of LEDs starting later this year.