This is the story of the successful move of a Taiwan electronics industry company into the living industry. Qisda has used shapes like coral flowers from the seas around Taiwan to conjure up LED lights as bright as coral and its LED light fixture products have taken the North America and European markets by storm.

This year Qisda entered five LED light products in one go in the major international design competitions. One, “Qisda Coral,” won the German 2009 Red Dot award and Japan’s G-Mark award (Good Design Award).  Qisda won the second most Red Dot awards in the lighting fixture category of any company in the world. Its LED light fixture products have proved to be best sellers in the fine home decoration markets in North America and Europe. Qisda Coral LED light is the product of cooperation between the company and the National Museum of Marine Biology/Aquarium. It has an eye catching appearance, a fashionable feel and a beautiful name: a flower as bright as coral.
  
Qisda Corporation formerly had the important role of contract 3C product manufacturing in the BenQ Group. Then, in 2008, Qisda established the “QisDesign” brand. In the last year the company has moved into the LED lighting market. Before moving into this fiercely competitive market, in which competitors include Hon Hai, AUO and TSMC, Qisda cleverly chose its strategic position.
   
Unlike others who rushed blindly into the street light and home light market Qisda deliberately positioned itself in the living industry. An LED light bulb costs NT$500 at most but a Qisda LED light sells for over NT$10,000, or 20 times more.

 
The key to being able to demand this fine products level price is Qisda’s carefully thought out business model: Story power X innovation power X business power. The prototype of the innovative product was the brain coral found in the waters of south Taiwan. Thinking often decides the direction we take. When the decision was taken for Qisda, formerly engaged in product design and manufacturing, to move into the living industry, the first thing that came into the head of designers was “The products have to be unique and have cultural basis”. They decided to tell a story.  

Story power:Telling a good story from Taiwan
 
Qisda vice president and Chief Design Officer Manfred Wang said “If you want to be innovative you have to make products different to ones made by others and have your own market segment.” “The target market from the start was North America and Europe, both places where consumers attach importance to cultural content. ‘On the international design stage products have to have cultural content and tell a story if they are to sell well” he said, outlining Qisda’s number 1 design principle.

However, Qisda formerly engaged in electronics products design and manufacturing and its engineers were used to working to strict size specifications, it being easier to design within a set framework. Living design does not have any specifications and the scope of choice is large, making it hard to not know when to stop. What should their objectives be in the vast lighting industry? Wang began to ponder this question and Taiwan came to mind. Taiwan is an island surrounded by a unique coral world.  

The world of coral is a beautiful prototype. Under the azure sea there is an interesting world that is full of life. Coral needs to live in water with a temperature of 23-25C and surface illumination strength cannot be greater than 1-5%, the water also has to be clear. In short an ecology with coral is clean.

Qisda began to position itself. If coral was the prototype for the product, it would not only introduce the world to Taiwan “the coral kingdom” it would also tell them about Taiwan’s sterling efforts in coral conservation so that when this product hit the international market it would have an irreplaceable position. Then, helped by the Industrial Development bureau, MOEA and III, Qisda was put in touch with National Museum of Marine Biology/Aquarium. It was decided that the products to be developed would be the “marine series” and it began to explore the secret world of coral. 

To acquire a thorough understanding of the undersea world of coral, Qisda’s design team went to the marine biology museum in south Taiwan and had a three days crash course in all things coral, this being intended to increase the depth of design. After looking at a number of pictures of various kinds of coral it was decided that ripples would be the focus of design. Manfred Wang said that choosing the name a flower as bright as coral” represented a major step in its transformation process. “We were at last able to leave behind traditional contract manufacturing!”he said, looking excitedly at this new product that is not even one year old yet but has been shown a warm response in high quality home product exhibitions across Europe.

Picture 1: deputy general manager of Qisda Corporation  Manfred Wang  said that to be innovative you have to make products different to those of other companies make, having your own market segment

Innovation power: Finding product uniqueness
 
With the elements of creativity in hand, Qisda focused on modern technology, using LED light source directional and precision light guide technology to raise the entry barrier for competitors. “We wanted to achieve the effect that only LED lights can achieve.” Manfred Wang said, taking the Qisda Coral as an example, the designers used special light guide  technology so the light emitted by the LED lights hidden within the heart of the coral flower  illuminates the edge of the petal, creating a beautiful rippling visual effect and transparent feeling. Another LED light, Qisda Crystal, was inspired by mineral crystals. Each unit-cell is like a crystal, reflecting the light around  and glittering like a diamond.

All these effects were achieved using the characteristics of LED lights. Don’t regard this “ripple effect’ lightly. To achieve a decorative border effect Qisda’s research team began in-depth research into the characteristics of LED. LED light is special, it is directional unlike conventional lights, the light of which is dispersed,and it naturally creates a decorative border effect. The in depth research carried out into LED light characteristics was rewarded by the creation of products that customers love.

Picture 2: Brain coral type light is a unique product and also evidence f the commercialization of digital archives.
Business power:Modularization allows products to be custom made
   

After putting so much effort into designing a light how to make it sell well and for a long time?   。Bringing its advantages as a contract manufacturing company, at the very start Qisda decided that its light fixtures would be able to be dissembled and reassembled in accordance with the “modularization concept. Because of the resources available from the BenQ group QisDesign products were able to move away from the fixed production method by which traditional light fixtures are made, making the elements of the light fixture removable and providing conditions for customized production according to customer requirements, giving the products more extendibility and optimizing the effectiveness of modules.

Taking the Qisda coral series as an example, the coral flowers can be put together to form a circle, as lovely as a flower or can be separately hung from the ceiling, creating an overhead coral sea, allowing space changes to be made at will. As for the Crystal series, the hexagonal crystals are attracted to each other by magnetism, allowing the user to make the shape they want. These have proved very popular with jewelry stores, shops and restaurants, allowing them to arrange the lights in a way that reflects their establishment’s style 

Picture 3: The coral series can be combined like flowers and can also be hung separately from the ceiling, allowing space to be changed at will

If a company transfers wisely it will find success. QisDesign brand was established just two years ago in the midst of the economic crisis. 2009 was planned as the year n which their products would be introduced by participating in trade shows and market needs gradually understood. There were no great expectations. However, story power, design power and product power combined powerfully and, after the shows, European fine goods suppliers, who attach importance to energy saving, contacted Qisda, allowing a sales channel different to previous 3C market sales channels to be developed. Then orders from hotels, restaurants and large enterprises in Europe, the US and Japan began to flood in.  

“This shows the power of innovative products” When he heard the production lines were short of materials and demand exceeded supply Manfred Wang knew that the decision to move into the high level LED light fixture market was the right one. With the increasing popularity of LED lights around the world because of their energy saving properties the LED industry is being regarded as potentially Taiwan’s next trillion dollar industry, following the semi-conductor and panels industries. Manfred Wang said Qisda was in the 3C sector for a long time and has witnessed the habitual specification competition and price cutting in the industry. Although output value grew in the end gross profit was very low.

In the early days after the decision to move into the LED light sector reports would always conclude with the words “very difficult” and from entering the new field to starting production took three years. However, Qisda’s careful approach, choosing the right market, sticking to its principles and innovative spirit allowed it to achieve success at the first attempt in the lighting market.

 “We are always trying to innovate, whether it be product, design or business mode” said Wang. Qisda has not just to meet the high gross profit challenge it always has the heavy responsibility of linking the upstream and downstream parts of the company to form a green value chain. From upstream crystals and packaging all the way to late stage Panels and streetlights, QisDesign will continue to produce innovative, attractive products that explore the possibilities of LED use.

Qisda has come up with new ideas with regards to LED market strategy: avoiding gross profit war and finding a market full of opportunity even if it isn’t the biggest market. “The market may not be large to begin with but it’s a good start."For Qisda the lights are on and the whole world awaits!