Samsung has confirmed that it is exiting the global LED lamps business to focus on LED components.
The company has issued a statement in which it said: “We have decided to discontinue our LED lamp business in all markets, except Korea, so that we can focus more resources on our core business areas. We will remain active in the LED industry through our LED component business, and continue to provide high-quality products and services to our customers.”
The news will come as a surprise to many, as it has often been predicted that the manufacturer, which is already a significant player in LED components, would develop a lamps and luminaires portfolio to rival some of the major names in the lighting industry. The Korean giant is often pitted as the emerging force and the company most likely to break into lighting’s ‘big four’ owing to its sizeable marketing budgets, its ability to develop consumer-focused products and the LED expertise it has garnered from its television and mobile telephone businesses.
Samsung appears to be the second company in recent times to deem the highly-commoditised and low margin world of LED retrofit lamps to be not worth the candle. Philips’ recent decision to split off its lighting division to focus on healthcare has been blamed, at least in part, on the cut-throat nature of the consumer LED lamp market where large companies struggle to compete with the aggressive pricing of smaller Asian competitors.
