UK-based Plessey says that the Regional Growth Fund (RGF) has officially granted £6.7m towards the expansion of its facility in Plymouth, UK for manufacturing its MaGIC (Manufactured on GaN-on-Si I/C) gallium nitride on silicon LEDs.
Plessey says that it will increase its manufacturing capacity from over 100 million square millimetres of gallium nitride material per year to more than 3 billion square millimetres. Facility modifications will take place during 2015, with additional manufacturing tools and supporting equipment coming on stream from 2015 through to 2017.
According to the report 'Lighting the Clean Revolution: The rise of LED street lighting and what it means for cities', lighting is responsible for 19% of global electricity use and about 6% of global greenhouse-gas emissions. Doubling lighting efficiency globally through LEDs would have a climate impact equivalent to eliminating half the emissions of all electricity and heat production in the EU. Also, in the UK alone, cutting the energy used by lighting by 40% would save £6.5bn in annual energy costs, and reduce energy demand equivalent to 33 mid-size power stations, it is reckoned.
Driven by high-brightness LEDs delivering higher energy efficiency in all lighting applications, the solid-state lighting market is projected to rise at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.31% to $22.2bn in 2020, according to a new market research report ('Solid State Lighting & Fluorescent Lighting Market by Technology - Forecast to 2020' from MarketsandMarkets).
"The expansion will bring additional well paid technical jobs to the site, and strengthen our long-term future by providing the base for new lighting technologies and products to be manufactured in the UK," says Plessey's finance director Chris Bailey. "The project also aligns very well with national strategies, such as the Growth Review, and it aims to increase and support manufacturing in the UK to make the UK Europe's leading exporter of high-value goods and services," he adds.
