Agilent and Lumileds introduce automotive SMT LEDs

Agilent Technologies and Lumileds Lighting, a joint venture between Agilent and Philips Lighting, have introduced the first three products in the new Envisium mid-power family of LEDs.

The Envisium Power PLCC-4 (plastic leaded chip carrier) surface-mount (SMT) LEDs are primarily intended for automotive exterior lighting, such as center high-mounted stoplights, front turn signals, rear combination turn, tail and stoplights, and mirror turn signals; and interior lighting applications, such as instrument panel and control backlighting, central console backlighting, and navigation and audio systems.

The Envisium Power PLCC-4 SMT LEDs, available in red, red-orange and amber, fill the need for mid-power illumination capabilities between the current Agilent PLCC-4 products, operating at up to 200 mW power levels, and Lumileds Lighting's Luxeon LED light sources that operate at power levels of 1 watt and higher. Other applications include home and commercial-building mood lighting and highlighting, garden lighting, and illuminated signs and signals.

"On the strength of this new co-development relationship, Agilent and Lumileds intend to increase our lead in fast-growing markets with a compelling set of Envisium solutions for automotive, consumer electronics and mobile phone customers," said Soo-Ghee Lee, vice president and general manager for the Optoelectronic Products Division in Agilent's Semiconductor Products Group. "We'll apply our well-known quality, competitive pricing, worldwide customer support and industry-best lead times to win in our markets."

The use of high-performance Lumileds TS (transparent-substrate) AlInGaP LED die enables the new LEDs to produce higher luminous flux output than any other PLCC-4 LEDs on the market. For example, the Envisium Power PLCC-4 SMT LEDs feature higher luminous output than the nearest competitor's offerings, which are widely used for automotive signaling applications.

"The Envisium Power PLCC-4 LEDs offer the best specifications in the industry," said Jason Posselt, director of product marketing at Lumileds Lighting. "They also offer much higher quality and reliability and superior mechanical characteristics to reduce tombstoning, prevent delamination and improve pick-and-place assembly."

The Envisium Power PLCC-4 SMT LEDs are based on the PLCC-4 standard package dimensions. The LED has a substrate made up of a molded plastic reflector on top of a bent lead frame. The die is attached within the reflector cavity, and the cavity is encapsulated by an Agilent proprietary epoxy blend. This package design, coupled with careful selection of component materials, allows the LEDs to perform with high reliability over the -40 C to +100 C temperature range, crucial in the harsh automotive operating environment. The Agilent-designed PLCC-4 SMT package can be driven at high current due to its superior package and thermal design, and is compatible with both IR-solder reflow and through-the-wave soldering.

The Envisium Power PLCC -4 SMT LEDs offer these typical performance specifications at 50 mA operating current, -40 C to +100 C operating temperature (minimum luminous intensity and typical total flux ranges are based on available intensity binning levels):

630 nm red: minimum luminous intensity 630-1000 mcd, typical total flux 2.6 lm
617 nm red-orange: minimum luminous intensity 1000-1580 mcd, typical total flux 4.3 lm
592 nm amber: minimum luminous intensity 630-1000 mcd, typical total flux 3.0 lm

Pricing of the Envisium PLCC-4 SMT LEDs is less than $0.20 in high-volume quantities.