The worldwide LED market grew 9.8% to $12.5 billion in 2011, with 44% growth in the lighting sector, according to Strategies Unlimited, who revealed the top-ten LED suppliers for the year. However, the outlook remains roughly flat for the next 5 years, peaking in 2013.

The worldwide high-brightness LED market grew from $11.3 billion in 2010 to $12.5 billion in 2011, a growth rate of 9.8%, according to market-research firm Strategies Unlimited. Demand for LED components (i.e. packaged LEDs) in the lighting market grew 44%, from $1.2 billion to $1.8 billion.

However, looking ahead, the annual revenues for packaged LEDs are likely to stay approximately flat for the next five years. The growth in revenue from the lighting sector will be largely offset by a decline in the backlighting sector.

The latest HB-LED market update was revealed during a pre-conference Investor Forum at the Strategies in Light event in Santa Clara. Analyst Ella Shum of Strategies Unlimited will go into more detail on HB-LED market developments in the keynote session of the conference on Wednesday February 8.

Leading LED suppliers for 2011

On the supply side, 10 companies accounted for more than 68% of the LED market in 2011. Strategies Unlimited arrived at these figures after analyzing market demand as well as the supply-side activity of 54 LED component suppliers.

The rank order of the top 10 suppliers in the LED market for 2011, by revenue of packaged LED components, is:

1. Nichia
2. Samsung LED
3. Osram Opto Semiconductors
4. LG Innotek
5. Seoul Semiconductor
6= Cree*
6= Philips Lumileds*
8. Sharp
9. Toyoda Gosei
10. Everlight

(*Companies have the same ranking when the difference in revenue is within the margin of error. Revenue includes packaged LED sales only, so pure-play LED chip companies such as Epistar are excluded).

LED supply by region

Geographically, Taiwanese and Chinese suppliers gained market share at the expense of the other regions. China