September 4, 2012...The US Department of Energy (DOE) has published the 2012 Solid-State Lighting (SSL) Manufacturing R&D Roadmap, which can be found at: www.ssl.energy.gov/sanjose2012_materials.html. The roadmap comes from recommendations made at meetings of LED and OLED experts in April. Other recommendations came from the 4th Annual SSL Manufacturing R&D Workshop in San Jose, California, June 13-14.

According to the DOE, the purpose of the Roadmap is to guide the R&D Programs and to help direct funding solicitations as well as provide guidance for equipment and material suppliers based on industry consensus about the expected evolution of SSL manufacturing. The goal of the manufacturing R&D initiative is to ultimately reduce costs of SSL sources and luminaires; improve product consistency while maintaining high quality products; and encourage the growth, leadership, and sustainability of domestic U.S. manufacturing within the SSL industry.

Many companies have ongoing DOE funded research projects in SSL manufacturing. Attendees to the Annual SSL Manufacturing R&D Workshop received updates of DOE funded projects from companies such as: Applied Materials, DuPont Displays, GE Lighting Solutions, KLA-Tencor, Moser Baer, Philips Lumileds, Sandia National Labs, Universal Display Corp (UDC), Ultratech, and Veeco.