A recent report from The Electronic Times Internet - IT News Service (a Korean IT trade site) give some very tantalizing glimpses of increased competition and lower prices to come in power LEDs as more companies move up to the next generation devices due to a collapsing market for LEDs in mobile phone handsets. That’s an exciting development, but the article also mentions an intriguing sounding AC-LED designed for direct connection to an AC power source: Seoul Semiconductor developed a high power LED, ‘Z-Power LED’ and an LED lamp used for lighting of households by connecting directly to AC power source. The company began supplying ‘Z-Power LED’ to an automobile maker last year, and it plans to commercialize the consumer LED lamp in the near future.

         I haven’t seen a lot of reportage on this, but this looks very significant to me.