LED industry, North America still needs to practice internal strength and steadily advance

At the end of 2013, good news came from overseas markets. For example, the United States in the North American market ushered in the third phase of the Clean Energy Act. From January 1, 2014, 40-watt and 60-watt incandescent lamps were eliminated, that is, home lighting incandescent lamp products. CSAReseach data shows that in 2013, there were more than seven thousand LED lamp export enterprises in our country, and the export target country was the United States, and the export volume showed an increasing trend year by year. Compared with the domestic market, customers in the North American market have high requirements for product quality and technology, mainly making products. Sun Weihua, vice president of qinshang Optoelectronics International Business Department, pointed out that the US market has high requirements on the performance and quality of products, and the specifications and structural requirements are quite different from those of the Chinese market, chinese manufacturers must customize products for such markets. In addition, various certifications, such as UL, DLC, energy star (ENERGYSTAR) Such as product specifications and safety requirements are clear, including light distribution, electrical parameters, glare, visual comfort, etc. , requiring higher energy-saving ratio. Zhou Xuejun, marketing director of PhilipsLumileds Asia, pointed out that a company can first come to the stage is a product, which is the foundation. To export, you must first make your products meet the requirements of the other market. Only with products that meet the requirements can we talk about other products, such as brands. This coincides with the statement of Wang Yinghua, deputy general manager of Shanghai Sansi electronics. Wang Yinghua said that the first thing customers need is the final product. If this step is not done well, there is no way to do it later. At present, think twice maintains a market share of more than 60 in the domestic road variable intelligence LED display field, and is also a manufacturer of LED display screens and LED lighting products with large domestic scale and large market share exported to North America. To export to the North American market, Chinese suppliers face many levels. For example, the market norms, certification systems, brand building, channel systems, etc. of the North American market are very different from China, which brings certain difficulties for Chinese manufacturers to develop the North American market. Product threshold the product first faces the technical threshold. The first is the product specification for the North American market. In order to regulate the LED market in foreign countries, two measures are usually adopted for the certification of LED lamps, one is mandatory and the other is subsidy incentive. [img] /uploads/allimg/140509/22-140509153503Z5. jpg [/img] Enforced, such as UL certification, ANSI ( AmericanNationalStandardsInstitute)Standards and FCC ( FederalCommunicationsCommission)Standard. UL safety certification is an extremely important part of compulsory certification. Its ultimate purpose is to obtain commodities with considerable safety standards for the market and contribute to the guarantee of personal health and property safety. The threshold for Chinese LED enterprises to enter the US market is to obtain UL certification. Subsidy certification, common energy star, DLC, etc. The commonality of all the above certifications is that they are time-consuming, expensive, and strict in auditing. This is a difficult problem for Chinese companies to successfully enter the North American market. However, VOC certification for lamps in China is usually not recognized by the US market, which virtually increases the technical threshold and cost for Chinese lighting products to be exported to the North American market. For example, UL certification requires 500 thousand yuan for one certification, and each certification number needs to pay more than 1000 US dollars per quarter, and the cost of producing products conforming to safety regulations certification is much higher than that of products without safety regulations certification, about 50. Another example is LED lamp manufacturers applying for Energy Star certification. LED products applying for Energy Star are currently limited to indoor LED light source products used to replace traditional incandescent bulbs, such as LED bulb lamps, PAR lamps, LED spotlights and other self-ballasted LED lamps. The time for applying for Energy Star certification for such LED products is at least 3000 hours (4 months)Above, and up to 6000 hours (Two years)Above. For such a long time, coupled with the impact of market price fluctuations and technological upgrading, it is unbearable for many domestic companies. In addition to subsidies for LED light source products certified by Energy Star, subsidies can also be obtained by applying for DLC certification. When applying for DLC certification, LED lamps need to provide safety reports issued by NRTL accreditation laboratories in the United States and EMC test reports issued by FCC accreditation laboratories, LM79 report made by NVLAP accreditation laboratory and LM80 report provided by lamp bead manufacturer. Compared with the requirements of the domestic market for the quality, performance and light efficiency certification of LED products, Lu Weixing, the boss of Hangzhou Yinxing lighting Appliance Co. , Ltd. , lamented that the certification of LED lighting products exported to the United States was too troublesome for Americans, UL standards, Energy Star and other certifications take a long time and invest a lot. Moreover, Americans have to review the production plants once a year. If they do not have certain strength, they cannot continue. An insider of Bai Liheng lighting revealed that because the quality requirements and quality requirements of foreign products are much higher than those of domestic products, it takes time and money to pass various certifications in foreign markets, therefore, for many small enterprises and enterprises with insufficient investment in technology, this kind of certification will drag them down. Wang Yinghua revealed that the third thought was approved to enter the list of US energy subsidy certification companies in 2010. At that time, only three companies entered the list, and the other two were American brands. To get a variety of licenses in the United States, it takes a long time and is more troublesome. Wang Yinghua said. Due to the geographical homology between Canada and the United States, DLC subsidy policy has also been vigorously promoted in Canada.