Tan Biao: Grind a "lamp" with the heart of research and development in ten years

Tan Biao Vice Chairman of Zhejiang Zhongbo Optoelectronics Technology Co., Ltd. Vice Chairman of Hangzhou Urban Lighting Industry Association

This column is jointly sponsored by Hangzhou Federation of Industry and Commerce and Daily Commercial Daily

Business Daily reporter Xie Chen

Tan Biao has been in touch with LED lights since 2003, and devoted himself to research and development. He took out a small copper plate that looked like a flying saucer, "This is a chip, and we have an invention patent for heat dissipation technology. At that time, we invested three times for this product. In the past year, several people have invested five or six million dollars in their pockets." Tan Biao recalled the scene at that time, and he also means to break the boat and fight the last stand.

Ten years to grind a "lamp".

Now Zhongbo Optoelectronics' status is second to none in the industry. "I also try to let go of young people, so I can retire." Tan Biao joked that the current research and development direction of the LED industry has become more perfect, he just wants to move forward The re-development of the chips at the end will lay the foundation for the future development of the company. "It is estimated that the idle time will not be idle."

1 Based on research and development products

The capital market comes naturally

Initially out of curiosity about the LED industry, Tan Biao and two other partners joined this emerging field. The development of an enterprise often has a lot to do with the growth rate of the industry. According to Tan Biao, their enterprise did not develop very fast in the early stage, "because the domestic LED industry was just starting, and the industry in Taiwan and Japan was similar. It is far behind, and some industry standards also refer to them.”

In such an industry environment, Tan Biao believes that starting from the team's own situation, we must first grasp two points, one is research and development, and the other is products. At that time, they had won 14 product patents and participated in the project of the Shanghai World Expo, "but for an enterprise, the product is the most convincing." To produce samples, funding has become a big problem, and because of The products are designed independently, the production quantity is small, and the production cost is very high. Many small start-up enterprises are often unsustainable.

At this time, Tan Biao considered financing mergers and acquisitions. Due to the good results in product R&D and design, there are many companies that offered an olive branch to Tan Biao. "At that time, it was almost discussed with a listed company, but Zhejiang University Wangxin has always insisted on hoping to cooperate with us." Tan Biao said , In addition to the more cost-effective equity transfer, he also hopes to cooperate with local enterprises in Hangzhou, so he newly established Zhejiang Zhongbo Optoelectronics Technology and became a subsidiary of Zhejiang Wangxin United Engineering.

Trial production started in October 2011, and sales of 12 million yuan were achieved in the past two or three months. In 2012, Zhejiang University Wangxin invested additional funds again, and Zhongbo Optoelectronics began to develop rapidly, with sales of 120 million yuan that year. The growth rate is about 30%. "In the first half of last year, the company's market share of finished street lamps was the first in the industry." So far, Zhongbo has completed the process of accumulation.

2 Shrinking product lines to achieve intelligence

Raise the industry threshold and compete for core competitiveness

The 20,000 street lights in the airport road section and Binjiang District are all products of Zhongbo, and all street lights are intelligently controlled. In the main control room that occupies a small area, you can know which street light has failed, and each street light has failed. The electricity consumption data of a street lamp.

Tan Biao said that in fact, the company also took a detour before determining the final product positioning, "In the beginning, we also made all kinds of lighting fixtures, from residential lighting to landscape lights, as well as the current main product street lights and so on. "But as the market competition became more and more fierce, he adjusted his strategy and shrank the product line, mainly producing high-power and high-wattage LEDs such as street lamps, tunnel lamps, and industrial and mining lamps. "This type of lamps has very high requirements for heat dissipation. The core technology of the company, and the segmentation will raise the threshold for other companies to enter this market.”

On this basis, Tan Biao also added an intelligent control system. Now the requirements for municipal road construction are getting higher and higher, especially after the use of new energy-saving control management, enterprises must improve the quality and cost performance of their products, "so in the project bidding, we also added the concept of intelligence to create 'Smart street light smart city'. This wisdom is also used in the design and renovation of tunnel lights, trying to use natural light to automatically adjust the brightness of lights to achieve secondary energy saving."

By using these technologies, about 70% of electricity can be saved, and the company will take a share of the electricity bills saved, and recover the cost in about three years. "But in this process, all maintenance work is undertaken by the company, which requires the quality of the product. Guaranteed, otherwise damage and failure will increase the cost of the enterprise." Each street lamp of Zhongbo Optoelectronics has to undergo a "pilot" for six hours before leaving the factory, and the testing instrument will record and save all test data to ensure the pass rate and stability of the product. sex.

Tan Biao is very confident in his products. In 2011, Zhongbo Optoelectronics' street lamps were exported to Mexico. Now three years have passed, and none of the 30,000 street lamps have problems.

3 In the future, the research and development will start from the chip and move forward

Prepare for the next development

With the advancement of the "Belt and Road", more and more domestic enterprises are "going out". Tan Biao said that their overseas markets are mainly concentrated in Mexico, Chile and Europe. "However, recently, the economic downturn of some European countries, including Germany, has also affected product exports. Although the market in Southeast Asia is large, the quality of products The good and the bad are mixed, which is not conducive to the development of the brand, and as the efficiency increases, it may face the problem of requiring a local factory."

For the development of overseas markets, he has several factors to consider. "One is the lack of local electricity, and the other is the high cost of electricity. In this case, the market demand is very strong." Generally speaking, these areas are mainly developing Chinese countries, and among these countries, Tan Biao particularly likes Mexico, which is located in Central America, which can play a role in linking the past and the next. "So I may consider building a local factory in the future."

In recent years, with the promotion of the domestic market and capital, the LED industry has developed rapidly. Zhongbo Optoelectronics previously obtained 50 million yuan from Hangshang Venture Capital and acquired a power supply factory. Waiting for the whole industry chain model, "At present, the product research and development in this field is quite sufficient. However, we are still lacking in the front-end chip manufacturing." Tan Biao said that there are only a few domestic companies engaged in this aspect. Research and development, in the future, he also hopes to move the focus forward to this link to prepare for the next rapid development of Zhongbo Optoelectronics.