1. What is in this section
A white paper is the document our component engineers write when an answer takes more than one page. It is not a catalogue entry and it is not a blog post. Everything in this section is written to be read once, carefully, by someone who has to make a decision about a part number.
- Industrial LED Reliability White Paper
Failure physics, qualification testing and design practice for long-life LED systems. Read this first if your current field failure rate is higher than you expect and you do not yet know which link in the chain is failing.
2. Where to start
Two questions decide which document you need. If your problem is which part, you want a selection paper. If your problem is why the part failed, you want a reliability paper.
| If your situation is this | Start with |
|---|---|
| You are choosing a package and need to justify the choice to a customer | Ceramic package selection paper |
| You have field failures and no failure-mode analysis | Industrial LED Reliability White Paper |
| You are specifying wavelength for a detection or curing process | Wavelength selection paper |
| You are asked for automotive qualification evidence | Automotive AEC-Q102 paper |
Every paper below is written to stand alone. You do not need to read them in order, and you do not need another paper open to understand one of them.
3. What a white paper differs from a knowledge page
The resource centre contains three kinds of document, and mixing them up wastes reading time. This section holds only the long-form ones.
| Document type | Length | Written for | You use it when |
|---|---|---|---|
| Knowledge page | 2,000-4,000 words | A engineer choosing a part | You need one specific number or one specific rule |
| White paper (this section) | 2,000-3,500 words, downloadable | A engineer or buyer defending a decision | You need the reasoning behind the numbers, to show a customer or a QA file |
| Application note | 1,500-2,500 words | Someone integrating into a system | The part is decided and the design around it is not |
The practical difference: a knowledge page gives you the answer, a white paper gives you the answer plus the reasoning plus the measurement that confirms it. If you have to write a justification paragraph, you want the white paper.
4. What these documents do and do not settle
They do settle
- Why a component degrades, in physical terms rather than as a warranty statement
- Which qualification test maps to which failure mechanism
- How to read supplier reliability data sceptically — which figures are measured, which are extrapolated, and which are marketing
- Which design choices actually extend field life, ranked by effect per unit of cost
They do not settle
- Part availability and lead time — ask your account contact
- Price at volume — the factory quotes against a forecast, not a list price
- Custom binning or private labelling — a commercial conversation
- Warranty terms — contractual, not technical
5. Typical questions these papers answer
- Can I drive any ceramic series at 1,500 mA? — the rating is set by die count, not by the package name, and the paper shows the arithmetic
- What has to be in a request for quotation for a ceramic part? — the six fields that determine whether we can quote accurately
- If I can only sample two series, which two? — a coverage argument, not a preference
- How do I check that a delivered batch matches the bin I ordered? — a receiving procedure
- Where do I get the parameters the handbook does not print? — what we can and cannot release
6. Related reading
If a paper sends you to a specific number, that number usually lives in a knowledge page. The component knowledge pages cover package technology, binning, wavelength selection and lifetime terms.
- LED Component Knowledge & Resources
The parent section: package fundamentals, binning, wavelength and lifetime terminology. - High-Power LEDs
Ceramic and automotive parts, with the selection and reliability papers collected underneath. - High-Power LED Test Reports
Measured data behind the claims in these papers.