LUXEON S Sets the Benchmark for Illumination Grade LEDs and Provides a New Way to Talk About LED Performance

As LUXEON S moves into volume production, the lighting industry is embracing the simplicity of hot testing and color binning and the quality of light that Philips Lumileds has proved possible with its white LUXEON LEDs. Introduced in February, the new LUXEON S LED is the most direct evidence that the LED industry is shedding its semiconductor skin and becoming a part of the lighting community.


“The language of our industry is changing,” said Rick Hamburger, the company’s Director of Segment Marketing. “To truly impact the lighting industry, we have to deliver more than numbers for efficacy and flux, we have to show we understand and can deliver illumination capabilities like ‘Punch’ and ‘Sparkle’. With LUXEON S we take a customer and application approach to delivering quality of light and ease of use for retail lighting applications like spot lamps.”

With LUXEON S, Philips Lumileds introduces new way of talking about Illumination Grade LEDs: Hot Testing and Binning, and Freedom From Binning.

 

Hot Testing and Binning describes the process by which Lumileds tests, targets, and specifies Illumination Grade LEDs. For LUXEON S, this means testing the product at 85°C which is the typical junction temperatures in an actual application. At this temperature, the company can provide accurate information about how LUXEON S will perform in the application. In addition, from a color perspective, it completely removes the need to understand, calculate, and adjust for color shift over temperature because the LED is already specified at the use temperature.

Freedom From Binning literally means that there are no color bin selections to be made. In the case of LUXEON S, this means that today, customers can select a correlated color temperature of 3000K and know that every LED, at real world operating conditions, will provide high quality white light (CRI>80) within a 3 step MacAdam Ellipse centered on the black body curve. The ability to target this level of color performance is unique to LUXEON LEDs and means the lighting industry can access unmatched uniformity and consistency within the light beam and between emitters.

LUXEON S is targeted at spot applications in the retail and hospitality segments where “Punch” is a critical factor. In addition to Freedom From Binning, LUXEON S delivers 1300 “hot” lumens from a very small optical source that enables a 10° beam from a compact reflector less than 50 mm in diameter. In a retail spot or down light the result is tight, sharp beams that deliver high center beam intensity with beam uniformity that highlights and gives depth to objects that are being illuminated.