What the UV LED landscape tells you
The findings that matter, worked out from the 540 patents in this report. Every insight links to the dashboard view it comes from, so you can check the evidence and the patents behind it.
What to do with it, by team
Each action links to its evidence
Search strategy
Three concepts searched in titles, abstracts and claims, combined, then read one by one. Only patents that claim a UV LED made by epitaxial growth of III-V materials were kept.
From 1.5 million hits to 540 relevant families
Bar length on a logarithmic scale, so each step down is a factor of ten
The three concepts
Scope: title, abstract and claims · priority 1995 to the search date (2014) · all jurisdictions
How each patent was read
Dimensions captured for every patent
Technology background and taxonomy
A short primer, then the full classification as a map. Open any branch to see how deep it goes; select a node to see its patents.
What a III-V UV LED is
A UV LED is a stack of thin crystal layers grown one atom layer at a time on a substrate, usually sapphire, SiC, silicon or GaN. The growth is epitaxial: each layer copies the crystal structure of the one below. Most patents use MOCVD; MBE and HVPE follow.
Light comes from the active region, typically multiple quantum wells of InGaN, GaN or AlGaN. The aluminium and indium content sets the bandgap and so the wavelength: more aluminium pushes emission deeper into the UV, toward UVC.
The hard part is quality. The layers do not match the substrate's lattice, which creates dislocations and cracks; high-aluminium layers are hard to dope and absorb light. These are the problems the patents in this report try to solve.
Taxonomy map
Numbers are patents. Click a dot to open or close a branch; click a label to select it.
Depth of the analysis
Distinct categories at each level of every dimension, with the patents classified there
Landscape overview
The size, speed and shape of the field: filing trends, who files, what is still alive, where inventions come from and where they are protected.
Filing trend
Patent families by year, split by legal status. Click a year to filter.
Competitor overview
Owners grouped by portfolio size. Click a tier or an owner to filter.
Legal status
As captured in 2017. Click a status to filter.
Where inventions originate
Country of first (priority) filing
Where they are protected
Families with at least one member in each market
Market expansion: origin × market
Share of each origin's families that are also filed in each market. Click a cell to filter both.
Patents behind the selection
Each patent number opens Google Patents.
Competitive benchmarking
The leading owners side by side: portfolio statistics, positioning, timing, and what each one works on by problem and by technology. Click any owner name to open its profile.
Portfolio statistics
Click a column heading to sort. Bars compare each value with the highest in its column.
Positioning: how recent and how global
Share of patents with priority 2010 or later, against average markets per family. Dot size is portfolio size.
Filing timeline
Patents per priority year. Darker cells mean more filings.
Who works on what
Owners against a problem or technology dimension. Click a cell to see the patents.
Competitor profiles
One page for any owner in the landscape. Pick a company, university or individual to see its activity, focus, problems, inventors and patents against the field.
Filing activity
Patents by priority year and legal status
Where it invents and protects
Technology and problem focus against the field
Bar: share of this owner's patents. Line: share across all 540 patents. A bar past the line means the owner over-invests there.
Problems it solves
Effect (patents): most cited causes
What changed after 2010
Categories that appear only from 2010 on, and those not seen since 2009
Top inventors
Patents
Each patent number opens Google Patents.
Problem–solution explorer
Every patent was read for the problem it solves: where in the LED it sits, what goes wrong, why, and what the inventor changed. Start from a problem area, then drill into effects, causes, owners and the solutions themselves.
Problem dashboard
All problem areas. Click a row to open it below.
Problem map: where × what goes wrong
Patents per problem area and effect. Click a cell to open that combination.
What goes wrong and why
Effect (patents): most cited causes. Click an effect to filter.
Who solves it
What the solutions change
Sub-areas over time
Each dot is a priority year; bigger dots mean more patents. Labels show whether a sub-area is consistent, emerging or fading.
Problems and solutions, patent by patent
Click a row for the reasoning, the full solution and the claimed layer stack.
Taxonomy explorer
The same drill-down as the problem explorer, starting from the technology: UV band, application, substrate, growth technique, active region, layer structure. Pick a dimension and level, then open any category.
Categories
Click a row to open it below.
Filing activity
Who owns it
What it is combined with, against the field
Bar: share of these patents. Line: share across all 540.
Problems, solutions, technology and owners in one view
Taxonomy → patents groups the patents and shows what each group solves, how, with what technology and by whom, with the patents last. Patent → taxonomy lists every patent with its full classification.
White space analysis
Cross any two dimensions, problems or technology, and see where nobody files. Gaps are ranked by how many patents you would expect there if the row and column were independent, so a hole between two busy areas stands out.
Matrix
Click any cell. Purple hatching marks the notable gaps listed alongside.
Most notable gaps
Empty or thin cells between busy rows and columns. Expected = row total × column total ÷ all patents.
Click a cell to see its patents
Inventor intelligence
Who invents in UV LEDs, for whom, on what, and who is rising or fading. Names are as printed on the patents; spelling variants of one person may appear separately.
Top inventors
Inventors with 5 or more patents. Click a row to open the inventor.
Filing activity
Employers over time
Most frequent co-inventors
Focus against the field
Inventors who moved between owners
Inventors named on patents of owners that do not share a patent, in order of first appearance. Co-owners on the same patent are listed too.
Top inventors × technology
Patents per inventor and category
Product to patent mapping
Both directions: from a product to the patents it may touch (risk assessment), and from a patent to the products it may read on (licensing). Two products mapped by our experts, and 113 products scored against all 540 patents. Our experts create claim charts for any patent–product pair on request.
Worked examples: mapped by our experts
Green edge = the patent discloses or claims the same feature as the product.
Two-way mapping
See each maker's products against its own patents, or (after a short sign-up) start from a product to see which patents it may touch, or from a patent to see which products it may read on.
Product catalogue: technology overlap by maker
Products listed for 13 patent owners, matched against the same owner's patents. Click a row to open the maker.
Products and patents by UV band
Patents matched most often
Products
Click a product for its features and every matching patent with the reasons. Strong = 8+ points, moderate = 6–7, indicative = 3–5.
Our experts create claim charts on request
For any patent and product in this report, or for your own: element-by-element mapping of the claims against product evidence from datasheets, samples or teardowns, ready for licensing or risk decisions.
My insights
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