LED chip manufacturer and Stan Technology have reached a cooperation to develop automotive MicroLED

On May 7, Stan Technology announced that its subsidiary Xiamen Stan Semiconductor Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Stein Semiconductor") and Qianzhao Optoelectronics officially signed a strategic cooperation agreement.

In this cooperation, the two parties will rely on the advantages of the semiconductor optoelectronics industry cluster in Xiamen Torch High-tech Zone and collaborate around core links such as Micro LED epitaxy, light-emitting chips and CMOS driver chips to further improve the industry chain supporting capabilities and accelerate the industrialization process of automotive Micro LED technology.

Image source: Stan Technology

Judging from the division of labor between the two parties, Stan Semiconductor mainly focuses on Micro LED display technology and has a strong research and development foundation in CMOS driver chips, high-precision bonding, white light integration technology and module packaging.

Stan Semiconductor's automotive Micro LED solution uses Die to Die/Wafer to Wafer process and combines AM drive and customized drive technology to reduce the cost of large-size automotive display modules. At present, Stain has obtained directional development and mass production orders for automotive Micro LED projects from some international Tier 1 suppliers.

Qianzhao Optoelectronics focuses on upstream Micro LED epitaxial wafers and light-emitting chip manufacturing, and has mass production capabilities in areas such as epitaxial growth and COW processes. The company has established an integrated self-developed mass production system from epitaxial growth to LED light-emitting chips, and has completed technical reserves in automotive lighting and display chip-level solutions, and has upstream core supply capabilities related to adaptive high beams (ADB).

Stan Technology stated that in the context of continuous upgrading of smart cockpits, vehicle-mounted display is becoming one of the most potential large-scale application directions of Micro LED. However, compared with the consumer electronics field, automotive grade applications have higher requirements for high temperature resistance, shock resistance, reliability, yield and cost control of devices, which further increases the importance of industry chain collaboration.

Judging from the current technology maturity, mass production yield, and vehicle specification adaptability, the Die to Die/Die to Wafer process combined with the sapphire epitaxy route is more suitable for the commercialization of automotive Micro LED at this stage. Both parties have made long-term plans in this direction. This cooperation is expected to further synergize technology and production capacity and accelerate the mass production of automotive Micro LEDs.

Automotive applications have become an important breakthrough direction for Micro LED

In fact, as smart cars upgrade towards digitalization and intelligence, Micro LED's attention in the fields of in-vehicle display and smart lighting is continuing to increase. Compared with traditional display technology, Micro LED has the characteristics of high brightness, high contrast, low power consumption and long life, making it more suitable for complex vehicle environments.

According to TrendForce’s analysis, Micro LED can be combined with transparent displays and car windows, and can also be used in the form of AR-HUD (augmented reality head-up display) or P-HUD (panoramic head-up display) to satisfy drivers and passengers in integrating virtual and real information in automotive scenarios.

Therefore, HUD is becoming one of the most concentrated directions for automotive Micro LED layout. Currently, panel manufacturers such as TCL CSOT, BOE, Shenzhen Tianma, AUO, and Innolux are accelerating related product development and technology reserves.

In addition to cockpit displays, the application of Micro LED in the field of automotive lighting is also promising. According to TrendForce analysis, with the introduction of Micro LED Pixel Array into adaptive headlights, the number of pixels that can be accurately and independently digitally controlled will be greatly increased to 100,000 pixels. The more LED pixels, the more flexible the illumination area can be to increase driving safety and meet the needs of various regional market regulations. This will help car light manufacturers reduce the costs of headlight development, production and logistics in different regional markets.

Under this trend, industrial chain companies are also accelerating their layout. According to LEDinside, auto parts manufacturers such as Marelli, Hella, and Xingyu Electronics, as well as upstream device suppliers such as ams OSRAM, Nichia, BOE Huacan Optoelectronics, Sanan Optoelectronics, Nationstar Optoelectronics, Jingneng Optoelectronics, Hongli Intelligence, Jinko Electronics, Jinghe Optoelectronics, Digital Optical Core, Xi Yuan Ji, Lisin Semiconductor, etc., have all launched relevant technical solutions or launched forward-looking layouts.

It is worth noting that the application boundaries of Micro LED are still further extended, gradually expanding from in-car display to out-of-car interaction. Take the French Peugeot concept car POLYGON released in November last year as an example. It introduced a Micro LED display at the C-pillar to display external information such as power. At the same time, the vehicle's light strips and front and rear light groups can also use Micro LED to achieve dynamic graphic display, thereby enhancing the vehicle's ability to interact with the outside world. In addition, this model also cancels traditional instruments and projects information directly to the front windshield through Micro LED modules to achieve a more immersive information presentation.

In the direction of vehicle projection, industry chain companies have also begun to promote product implementation. On April 17 this year, Stan Technology announced that it would release a Micro LED automotive module product at an exclusive display event for Tier 1 customers of leading automobiles. This product is based on a self-developed CMOS driver chip with a brightness exceeding 1000lm. It is mainly targeted at application scenarios such as vehicle-mounted short-distance projection.

Cooperation in the Micro LED industry chain continues to heat up, and application scenarios are accelerating expansion

As the automotive market gradually opens up, cooperation in the Micro LED industry chain is also heating up significantly. Since this year, in addition to Stan Technology and Qianzhao Optoelectronics, another company focusing on the field of automotive Micro LED, Xingyu Co., Ltd., is also accelerating related projects.

On January 10 this year, Xingyu Technology, Xinglian Integration and Jiufengshan Laboratory signed a contract for the Micro LED intelligent light technology R&D and manufacturing base project. The project was launched in Wuhan East Lake High-tech Zone, focusing on promoting the R&D and industrial application of Micro LED in the fields of vehicle lighting, optical communication and AI display.

At the same time, Micro LED cooperation is also extending to emerging scenarios such as AI optical interconnection, AR micro-display and high-end home display.

Among them, as the demand for AI computing power continues to grow, and the demand for high-speed transmission and low-power communication in data centers is rapidly increasing, the application of Micro LED in the field of optical interconnection is gaining attention, and many LED industry chain companies have accelerated related layouts.

On January 15 this year, BOE Huacan Optoelectronics and Shanghai New Phase Microelectronics signed a strategic cooperation agreement. The two parties will jointly develop low-power, high-bandwidth, and high-reliability Micro LED optical interconnect modules for intelligent computing centers through the "chip manufacturing + driver design" collaborative model.

Two days ago, Nitron Technology also announced its cooperation with Optical Xun Technology. The two parties plan to combine Micro LED light-emitting array and GeSi avalanche photodiode (APD) array technologies to develop a next-generation optical interconnect platform, aiming to achieve system energy consumption of less than 1 pJ/bit and Tbps/mm2 level bandwidth density to meet the high-speed transmission needs of AI and HPC.

In March, MediaTek, together with Microsoft Research and multiple partners, announced the successful development of a new generation of active optical cable (AOC) using Micro LED micro light sources. This solution improves transmission distance while taking into account copper cable-level reliability, and is regarded as one of the important directions for high-speed interconnection of AI servers. Then in April, SmartSite revealed that it was cooperating with TSMC to explore Micro LED CPO integration solutions through CoWoS advanced packaging technology.

At the same time, AR/VR has also become one of the important directions for Micro LED cooperation this year.

In January this year, South Korea's SEMIFIVE and SAPIEN Semiconductors launched a CMOS backplane technology cooperation to develop Micro LED solutions for AR/VR and wearable devices. In the same month, Fucai reached a cooperation with Germany's ALLOS Semiconductors to jointly promote the mass production of 8-inch gallium nitride on silicon LED epitaxial wafers and accelerate the application of Micro LED in highly integrated display scenarios such as AR. In March, Jingce Electronics cooperated with Shanghai Xianyao Display on Micro LED micro-display testing system and key testing equipment to promote the industrialization of AR near-eye display.

In addition to the above-mentioned emerging directions, the application of Micro LED in home display and commercial interaction scenarios also continues to expand. At this year's ISLE 2026 exhibition, Nova Nebula and LG jointly launched a Micro LED home living room display solution for home audio-visual and e-sports scenarios. At the same time, AU Optronics teamed up with faytech and Napster to display a transparent Micro LED interactive advertising machine at ISE 2026, combining AI platform and transparent display technology to target commercial application markets such as retail.

Summary

Overall, as application demands for automotive, AI optical interconnection, AR/VR and high-end displays continue to be released, the collaboration of the Micro LED industry chain is significantly strengthening. From the cooperation between Stan Technology and Qianzhao Optoelectronics, to the accelerated joint R&D and mass production layout of upstream and downstream enterprises in the industry chain, it is reflected that Micro LED is gradually moving from the technology verification stage to the industrialization stage.