Introduction to LED Light Manufacturer Screening
Besides quality inspection services, BackMorning screens LED light manufacturers and their products. We will introduce their company information and product information on our website regularly. Quality is the sole criterion for picking these manufacturers and LED lights. And the selection criteria are based on the quality tool 5M1E.
To make it clear about how we will use this quality tool to select reliable factories of LED lights for recommendations, we will list the details and explain them below. So, you can properly evaluate whether a manufacturer is for you.
Our criteria for screening manufacturer screening will include 2 parts. The first part is for the top management. And the second part is a checklist of some critical points.
The Top Management
BackMorning believes that the top management of a manufacturer relies largely on their top management. The people of their top management determine the overall quality level of their products. For this reason, we will need to check 3 critical points of the top management team.
The top management is indirect to product quality, which means they don’t solder the lights, and don’t use those instruments to check critical optics performance. However, they are the foundation of quality assurance. The same concept for the foundation of a skyscraper – you can’t reach the height without it.
In order to obtain basic information about the top management of a manufacturer, we will do background research on the National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System. This is a governmental system, and some basic information about a business is available to the public, and free to check.
1). Shareholder Structure
Stable top management is critical for making critical decisions. And this will have a direct or indirect influence on the overall quality that a manufacturer can provide in the long term. The management people determine many things – especially the owner or the general manager, including competition strategies and resource assignment.
It takes time to build quality – workers need time to learn manufacturing techniques, and products need time to optimize. Different people tend to have different opinions and plans. So, if the people in the key positions change, there will be influences on product quality sooner or later, better or worse.
Preferable: No changes regarding shareholders, legal representatives, or owners in the last 3-5 years.
Unpreferable: Unstable shareholder structure, legal representatives, or owners.
2). Development direction
Resources are always limited, no matter for a privately owned company or a listed company. It is impossible to assign as many resources as you want to all of your investments. You will always have to face tradeoffs, and you have to focus on one thing before you become excellent at it.
For this essential reason, a manufacturer will be able to offer the best quality of LED lights that they can, if they only focus on this industry. Actually, it is not uncommon for companies to diversify their investments – some bigger companies even invest in multiple different industries at the same time – real estate, logistics, etc.
Meanwhile, patents are also useful indicators. Those files are important results of their efforts. We will check how many patents a manufacturer has in the last 3 years, and whether the patents are for LED lighting products. This result will also tell whether the company is building strength on LED lights or spreading its resources in different industries.
Preferable: The manufacturer focuses on the lighting industry in the last 5 years, and has approved patents for lighting products and components, etc.
Unpreferable: Invest in another industry that has nothing to do with lighting.
3). Factory address
There are different ways for a manufacturer to find an address for production. They can build a factory at the address of their own or sign a long-term rental contract. Either way will be good as long as the production will be stable.
Relocation may not be good for some reasons. One of them is the negative impacts on machines and instruments due to repeated disassembly and assembly, including transportation. Improper handling of machines and instruments can lead to potential degradation of machines and instruments, which is negative for product quality.
Another negative impact can be that it’s common for some experienced workers to leave after relocation. A manufacturer will have to find new workers to fill their positions. It will take time for the new people to learn and understand those manufacturing procedures and techniques.
Preferable: Better not to have relocated twice or even more in the last 5 years.
Unpreferable: Repeated relocation during the last 5 years.
Critical Points for Selected Manufacturers
The checklist below includes the points that BackMorning checks to select LED light manufacturers for the recommendation. These points are universally applicable to makers of various types of LED lights – LED light sources, indoor LED lights, commercial LED lights, streetlights, stadium lights (sports lights), high bay lights, etc.
1). People
As mentioned above, everything is done by the people in a factory. Therefore, we have to check whether the workers of a manufacturer have the foundation for offering LED lights of good quality.
For screening manufacturers at the initial stage, we don’t have to systematically verify how the manufacturer manages their workforces in the right way. We can focus on the points that are the closest to quality assurance.
We believe 2 types of people are good indicators for this purpose. One is the people with fundamental technical backgrounds, skills, and experience. The other type is the people for quality assurance.
Preferable:
- Have professionals responsible for various departments of a factory: manufacturing, research and development, quality, purchase, and material warehouse. Have quality inspectors who can use the fundamental instruments for testing the reliability, optics, and safety of lights.
Unacceptable:
- Have fundamental testing instruments in the labs, but no full-time professionals for key positions. Only assign some part-time workers to use the instruments occasionally.
2). Machines and Instruments
It’s impossible to produce anything without proper machines, and also impossible to assure product quality without proper instruments. For this reason, we need to consider the ones closest to product quality.
The manufacturers we focus on are for LED lights as finished products, rather than components or materials. For this reason, we only pick the makers that have assembly lines for products of their own. They must not outsource LED lights to another manufacturer.
And for testing instruments, we will check the ones that make quality manufacturers stand out. It means that not all manufacturers have such instruments, only those who focus on quality will have them and make good use of them.
Preferable:
- Have assembly lines of their own, aging test facilities for production (not only for sample testing), and IP testing instruments for the production lines (for outdoor LED light manufacturers).
Unacceptable:
- Any one of the machines or instruments listed above is not available for a manufacturer.
3). Material Management
Product quality begins with proper material management. On the one hand, all materials require proper temperatures and humidity to stay in good condition. On the other hand, you have to sort them and keep track of them.
A manufacturer will need industrial air conditioners and dehumidifiers to offer optimum storage for materials. It is also good to use other facilities for the same purpose. It is not acceptable if they don’t have anything to assure proper storage conditions.
Keeping track of materials doesn’t necessarily require additional investment – like ERP systems or laser scanning with bar code systems. The factory can do it with basic sticky labels and printed tables, as long as such an inventory management system works.
Preferable:
- Have fundamental facilities to maintain a constant temperature and humidity storage for electronic materials.
- Maintain a reliable material management system with basic data tracking.
Sort and track materials effectively with a system with basic labeling and quantity management.
Unacceptable:
- No proper facilities to manage storage conditions for electronic materials, and no effective inventory management in practice.
4). Methods
There are many manufacturing procedures and techniques in the factories. We don’t need to check each of them or systematically for screening quality manufacturers. Again, we will pick the ones that help them stand out.
Quality is in the details. We will examine two assembly practices that are important but barely noticeable for some manufacturers.
The first assembly practice is the electrostatic bracelets and proper application. The stationary electric charges can be deadly for electronic components, but you may not be able to identify their potential damages, which may be noticeable in the long run. The proper application of electrostatic bracelets is an effective way to prevent such damage.
Excessive high temperatures can lead to significant degradation of performance and quality of the electronic components. Meanwhile, soldering has a direct impact on the lifespan of electronic components. Therefore, a demanding manufacturer must have effective temperature control practices for proper soldering.
Preferable:
- People in key positions (during assembling electronic components) wear electrostatic bracelets. And electrostatic bracelets function properly.
- Apply effective temperature control practices for soldering procedures during production.
Unacceptable:
- People in those key positions don’t wear electrostatic bracelets or don’t make sure they function properly. No temperature control for soldering.
5). On-Site Management
The production environment has an influence on the finished products. Especially the contaminations are negative for quality. Meanwhile, the workers must separate the good ones and the bad ones, so they won’t make mistakes.
We will take the assembly lines into consideration. They must be tidy so that the LED lights will stay good, and the workers won’t make mistakes.
This has something to do with the quality of process management of a manufacturer. If a manufacturer has well-planned schedules for the assembly lines, those products won’t pile up there. Otherwise, it’s not uncommon to see the assembly lines buried by products. You can use this condition as an indicator to evaluate how well a manufacturer can manage their production schedules.
Preferable:
- The assembly lines are arranged neatly and in good order.
Unacceptable:
- The assembly lines are in chaos or look untidy and dirty. Mix defective semi-finished products with quality ones, and stack PCBA on top of each other.
6). Laboratory Instruments
Lighting is not an easy subject, and the quality of light is a combination of multiple parameters. Therefore, a manufacturer can’t just rely on the naked eye to judge the quality of LED lights. They must have some fundamental instruments for necessary tests.
We will consider the instruments and devices that will be used frequently and require comparatively smaller investments. Some tests require millions of RMB to invest in their facilities. It’s acceptable for the manufacturer to outsource such tests.
An LED light manufacturer must have the fundamental instruments listed below.
- Integrating Sphere
- IES Tester
- Safety Testers
- Long Time Aging Shelves
- Drop Tester
- Vibration Tester
- Thermal Tester
- High-Temperature Chamber
- Low-Temperature Chamber
- Surge Tester
Instruments & Facilities for IP ratings:
- IPX3/IPX4 Water Spraying Tester
- IPX5/IPX6 Water Spraying Tester
- IPX7/IPX8 Water Immersion Tester
Bonus:
The instruments listed below are not used quite often, and some can take millions to invest. LED light manufacturers can outsource such tests for more logical solutions.
- EMI/EMC Chamber
- Thermal Shock Tester
- UV Tester
Final Thoughts
We have listed the details for our LED light manufacturing screening criteria. The points are based on the commonly adopted quality tool 5M1E. If you still have questions about the manufacturers that we’ve selected, or you wish to get in touch with them, feel free to drop us a line.
We usually reply in a few hours.