In Japan, the government, LED manufacturers, buyers, most of people are now promoting LED lighting technology in their life and work. After the earthquake in 2011, the needs for energy-saving became significant and necessary, which led to a vigorous development of LED lighting applications in Japan. In 2011, the spread of LED bulbs was far beyond the expectation of people. However, the supposed prosperous of LED bulb market has not come finally. LED manufacturers had to face up with rather naughty situations. LED technology has indeed spawned a new growth in the lighting area, bringing hope to the lighting market. But on the other hand, the long service life of these bulbs reduced the demand, plus the increasingly intense competitions, forcing large local LED companies to convert the business structure.
In early August, in one large home appliance store in Osaka, on the corner of floor one, reporters saw counters are piled up with LED bulbs. Labels of “low-price” were stick on boxes, like “4,650 yen for three”, “7,750 yen for five”…
According to the store’s sales, from May of this year, sales of LED bulbs started to trap in the doldrums. Due to the constant prices dropping, buyer chose to wait, it turned out that sellers’ expectations came to nothing.
It is really a hard time for LED bulb market in Japan. The re-construction of nuclear power plants in Japan still remained some distances off, some local governments required each ordinary household to save more than 10% daily electricity. Under such serious circumstance, LED bulbs are still unmarketable. Mr. Koji Sato, the registrar of the electrical appliances giant Toshiba, said, “the sales of LED bulbs is only 80% of that in 2011. It was expected previously that sales of LED blubs will climb up to the peak during 2013-2014. But now, it seems that 2011 is the peak year for the LED bulb market in Japan.”
The global general lighting market has a scale of 7 trillion to 10 trillion yen, and the scale of Japan is about 800 billion yen. In 2011, although that LEDs’ occupation has expanded to 17% in the general lighting market, the previously “hot” LED bulbs began to cool down.