they switch to LEDs across the board

While LED backlighting is a short-term market trend, the market for LED general lighting applications will take off only in the mid-term. Before this application will achieve a major breakthrough, the LED technology has to overcome certain technological hurdles, especially with respect to their efficiency. Pickert pointed out  that the led flood light is not yet fully competitive against sodium discharge lamps and fluorescent lamps in widespread use for street lighting, in ten years it certainly will be the dominant lighting source but we do not expect a strong market demand before 2012/2013. However, what Pickert did not say is that manufacturers of lighting devices such as Germany's Osram or Dutch Lumiled probably intend to exploit the market potential for today's energy saving lamps before they switch to LEDs across the board.

Nevertheless, Pickert does not see LED production overcapacities comparable to the DRAM market since the short- and mid-term growth factors are tangible. He noted "Energy saving is not only popular in Europe. If you take a look to California, you will see great advances towards this direction. For instance, all traffic lights are equipped with LEDs. Also in China, the demand for energy-saving lighting solutions is rising; the Chinese government recently has launched a Solid State Lighting initiative that aims at replacing light bulbs and similar energy hogs by LEDs. All these factors however will create demand only in about three to five years.”

Aixtron claims to control about 70 percent of the global market for Metal Oxide Chemical Vapor Deposition (MOCVD) equipment used to produce III/V semiconductors and thus LEDs. The market volume for this type of led high bay light equipment currently is estimated to about $300 million per year. Aixtron regards US-based Veeco Instruments as its only competitor in international markets; besides Veeco, there are several smaller MOCVD vendors in Japan which however are serving only local markets.