i-Tex · Intelligent and luminous textiles

Driven by advances in R&D and in inorganic light-emitting diodes (LEDs), the Lighting industry is expected to change substantially in the next five years. At the same time, a shift in the value chain from components (LEDs) towards intelligent lighting systems is expected. This technology trend is mirrored by similar market trends substantiated by end-users expectations for miniaturization of electronic devices and integration of intelligence in light emitting devices. Consumers will wish to have a more pervasive presence of intelligence (e.g. to communicate, to display information, and to process data). In order to lead in R&D as well as in manufacturing and market applications, the European Lighting industry has to fully harness the potential of the inorganic LEDs-based illumination by investing in new technologies that will allow for new types of lighting solutions via cost-competitive highly reliable manufacturing processes. These future energy efficient lighting solutions will not only drive and be driven by requirements of low total ownership costs (e.g. in B2B sales), but will also take into account new consumers' needs such as a more pervasive intelligence, novel design possibilities and novel user interfaces.<br/>i-Tex targets the Research, Development & Production feasibility of large area intelligent lighting systems based on smart coated textiles.<br/>Although numerous research projects have investigated smart textiles with LED integration, none of them has targeted the development of technology and system architecture for reliable large area illumination systems. The main reasons for this are 1) the high costs and complexity in manufacturing of such smart textiles, 2) demanding reliability requirements of general illumination requirements , and 3) the optical output needed for lighting applications.<br/>The i-Tex project proposes to overcome the above limitations by research and development of:•\tnovel large area system architectures for electronic interconnections and thermal management of inorganic LEDs in coated textiles•\tcost-competitive roll-to-roll (RTR) manufacturing processes for the heterogeneous integration of lights, sensors in coated textiles.•\tnovel material classes (e.g. tunable pigments) for new appearances and high optical output.•\tconcurrent reliability study and robustness approach over the entire value chain of the targeted products.<br/>By identifying a number of indoor and outdoor applications for intelligent functional, and decorative lighting, we will be able to define sets of clear product specifications. Based on these requirements we will simultaneously develop unique large area interconnections for LEDs and other electronics, identify the most appropriate coating technique and coating materials for RTR manufacturing, investigate smart textile optics, resulting in a smart system with high reliability and high optical output.