Infrared light-emitting diodes (IR leds) and laser pointer diodes (LD) are not new technologies. They were invented in the 1960s. Recently, however, solid state lighting (SSL) has grown rapidly. LED and LD were originally developed for optical communication applications, but now they are widely used in data communication/telecommunications, consumer electronics, automotive and industrial fields to achieve more high-value functions.
Various LED and LD products have found their own development path:
-ir leds, which initially focused on low-end applications such as optoelectronic circuit breakers and remote controls, are increasingly being used for proximity sensing in smartphones, gesture recognition in cars, and eye tracking in virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) devices.
– the edge-emitting laser (EEL) market has historically been driven by optical communications applications. The EEL market will also continue to benefit from the increased volume of data exchanged with fibre optic networks. However, growth drivers may also be found in new applications, such as LiDAR.
– VCSEL was originally used for short-range data communication, but Apple’s iPhone X, released in 2017, integrated VCSEL based 3D sensing, thus completely changing the commercialization prospects of VCSEL, making it the fastest growing solid-state light source technology in the market and attracting a lot of money