WestLake Smoky Mountains Technologies (Hangzhou) Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as “WestLake Smoky Mountains”) was established in May 2022. Backed by Westlake University, the company focuses on developing full-color AR/VR high-density Micro LED chips. These chips are created using wafer-level integration of RGB inorganic thin films (including fabrication, stripping, and stacking of inorganic films), offering key technological advantages such as inorganic full-color RGB integration, low-temperature wafer integration, and simplified processes that improve yield rates. WestLake Tech Venture invested in the company in 2022, and the business has since secured multiple financing rounds.
The Core of Consumer Electronics: Display Modules
Display modules represent the most significant cost component in consumer electronics. Since the invention of LED technology, it has evolved through multiple stages—from solid-state lighting and backlighting in displays to LED screens. However, traditional LED displays have limitations in pixel density, brightness, and contrast. To overcome these challenges, Micro LED technology emerged. By integrating high-density, miniature LED arrays onto a single chip, Micro LED achieves miniaturization, thin-film application, and matrix integration.
As a leading domestic manufacturer of next-generation Micro LED display technology, WestLake Smoky Mountains possesses critical technologies that address key pain points in the Micro LED industry. Their products offer high brightness, energy efficiency, wide color gamut, and long lifespan—all essential characteristics for full-color display chips.
From Lab Research to Mass Production
Dr. Wei Kong, the entrepreneur behind WestLake Smoky Mountains, was once a researcher. He holds a PhD in physics from Sun Yat-sen University and a PhD in electrical engineering from Duke University. He later conducted postdoctoral research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the field of low-dimensional and bulk material heterostructures, pioneering a new direction for multifunctional integration of heteromaterials. This research laid the foundation for his future entrepreneurial endeavors.
After returning to China, Dr. Kong joined the School of Engineering at Westlake University, where he developed a series of industrialized processes for Micro LED display technology. These included large-size low-temperature wafer integration techniques that solve the color accuracy and yield bottlenecks in current Micro LED displays.
In May 2022, leveraging Westlake University’s academic-industrial collaboration platform, Dr. Kong founded WestLake Smoky Mountains Technologies with the goal of launching the world’s first fully solid-state full-color Micro LED chip and driving the development and mass production of next-generation display technology.
Pushing the Boundaries of Conventional Technology
Micro LED technology represents a breakthrough in LED miniaturization and matrix technology. It integrates high-density, miniaturized LED arrays on a single chip. Conventional Micro LED pixels use a red-green-blue (RGB) layout, which often results in lower resolution and high energy consumption. In contrast, WestLake Smoky Mountains‘s single-pixel Micro LED features a vertically stacked RGB structure, effectively eliminating color discrepancies and significantly improving display performance.
This innovation is made possible by the company’s core technologies: wafer-level three-color semiconductor thin-film stacking and wafer-level low-temperature GaN thin-film stripping. These technologies have enabled WestLake Smoky Mountains to develop active light-emitting full-color Micro LED chips. By integrating mature front-end processes, they have optimized Micro LED wafer designs, reducing process difficulty and ensuring high yields, thus lowering the commercial barriers for Micro LED displays.
As a next-generation display technology, Micro LED surpasses current technologies in terms of resolution, response speed, viewing angles, brightness, contrast, and energy efficiency, outperforming both first-generation LCD and second-generation OLED technologies. Its potential for large-scale production is highly feasible. Dr. Kong states, “Compared to current LED or OLED technologies, Micro LED offers more advantages, such as higher brightness and longer lifespan.”
In terms of applications, WestLake Smoky Mountains offers both direct-view and micro-display product lines. These can be used in traditional display applications, such as smartwatches and smart TVs, as well as in future display technologies for automotive displays, wearable devices, and AR glasses.
“The latest generation of Micro LED displays can be applied in two forms: large-screen devices for indoor use, such as televisions, computers, and even mobile phones and smartwatches, as well as high-density Micro LED displays that can be as small as a fingernail or even a grain of rice. These miniaturized displays can be used in AR glasses,” Dr. Kong explains.
Driving Commercialization and Overcoming Production Challenges
With the support of Westlake University’s research-industry collaboration, WestLake Smoky Mountains has utilized local policies and funding resources, as well as an effective talent recruitment and development system, to rapidly accelerate technology transfer from “lab” to “production line” in just over a year. They have patented key technologies involved in direct-view, micro-display, and quantum projects, enhancing their innovation capabilities and ensuring a successful commercialization of Micro LED products.
WestLake Smoky Mountains now has a portfolio of Micro LED technologies capable of providing high brightness, energy efficiency, wide color gamut, and long lifespan—all of which solve the industry’s key technical and mass production challenges.
Thanks to their innovative work in Micro LED display technologies, Dr. Kong has been selected for the National High-level Young Talents Program and has received the Zhejiang Provincial Innovation Long-term Project award. In early 2023, the company was also selected as a 2023 Westlake “University Economy Benchmark Project”. Furthermore, in July of this year, the company’s “Full-color AR/VR High-density Micro LED Chip” project won an entrepreneurial award.
Dr. Kong envisions a future where, “Just as everyone has a mobile phone now, in the future, everyone might have AR glasses.”
Looking ahead, WestLake Smoky Mountains will continue to drive the application and commercialization of Micro LED technology, creating a new ecosystem for Micro LED innovations and leveraging advanced technologies to develop the next generation of display products.
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