As a 940nm VCSEL supplier working closely with industrial customers every day, I get this question constantly: “Can 940nm VCSEL be used for industrial sensing?” The short answer is a resounding yes, but the full story is about how this technology solves problems that older industrial sensing approaches can’t, and why more manufacturing, automation, and process industries are switching from traditional sources like infrared LEDs and edge-emitting lasers (EELs) to 940nm VCSELs. Let me walk you through the real-world applications, the science that makes it work, and why our customers are making the shift. 940nm VCSEL
First, let’s ground this in what 940nm VCSELs are, and why they’re different from the tools industrial teams have relied on for decades. VCSEL stands for Vertical Cavity Surface Emitting Laser. Unlike EELs, which emit light from the edge of a semiconductor wafer, VCSELs emit light perpendicular to the wafer surface—think of tiny, pinpoint light sources arranged in arrays, like pixels on a screen. At 940nm, this is a near-infrared (NIR) wavelength that’s been widely used in industrial sensing, but for years, the limitation was power, reliability, and beam quality at scale. That’s where our team has spent the last 10 years: refining 940nm VCSEL design to deliver consistent, high-power output without the headaches of older NIR sources.
For industrial sensing, beam quality is non-negotiable. If your light source is messy, your sensor’s measurements will be too. EELs often have elliptical beams that need additional optics to shape into a uniform circle, adding cost and complexity to industrial systems. LEDs, while cheap, emit incoherent light with a wide divergence angle, so you lose a lot of power before it reaches the target, and you can’t get tight, long-range beams. 940nm VCSELs, by contrast, produce circular, collimated beams with near-Gaussian intensity profiles. That means every photon goes where it needs to, not scattered at random angles, which is critical for applications like distance measurement (LiDAR for automation), thickness gauging, and material identification.
Let’s talk about the most common industrial sensing use cases right now, because that’s where 940nm VCSELs are making the biggest impact. Take 3D machine vision, a core technology in automotive assembly, food processing, and electronics manufacturing. Before VCSELs, 3D vision systems relied on stereo cameras or structured light from LEDs. But stereo cameras struggle with low light and reflective surfaces, which is a huge issue in auto plants where car bodies are painted glossy black, or in electronics factories where silicon wafers reflect light at 940nm. 940nm VCSEL arrays solve this by projecting a dense, precise grid of NIR light onto a part. The camera captures how that grid distorts, and software calculates the exact 3D shape of the part, even on reflective or dark surfaces. We recently worked with a tier 1 automotive supplier that switched from LED-based structured light to our 940nm VCSEL arrays, and their part inspection accuracy jumped from 92% to 99.8%, while their system cost dropped 18% because they eliminated the extra optics they needed for LEDs.
Another fast-growing use case is inline material gauging and quality control. For industries like glass manufacturing, metal stamping, and pulp and paper, measuring thickness, density, or surface defects in real time is critical to reducing waste and meeting regulatory standards. 940nm NIR light interacts with materials in predictable ways: some absorb it, some transmit it, some reflect it. At 940nm, we’ve found that it’s the sweet spot for non-destructive testing of industrial materials. For example, thin metal foils used in battery manufacturing—we supply VCSELs to a lithium-ion battery maker that uses 940nm VCSELs to measure the thickness of copper and aluminum foils as they roll off the production line. LEDs couldn’t deliver enough power at long range (these foils are moving at 50 meters per minute) to get a clear signal, and EELs had inconsistent beam shape that caused measurement noise. Our 940nm VCSELs, which are rated for 10,000+ hours of continuous operation (that’s years of 24/7 use without replacement), deliver a stable, uniform light beam that lets their sensor measure thickness to within 1 micrometer, a spec that’s impossible to hit with older technologies.
Distance and range sensing, or industrial LiDAR, is another big one. As factories adopt more collaborative robots (cobots) and autonomous guided vehicles (AGVs), they need reliable obstacle detection that works in all lighting conditions—from the bright overhead lights of a factory floor to the dim lighting in a warehouse. 940nm is ideal here because it’s invisible to the human eye, so workers don’t have safety concerns about exposure, and it’s not affected by ambient light like visible wavelength lasers. A 940nm VCSEL-based LiDAR can detect an obstacle 20 meters away, even in direct sunlight, whereas a 850nm VCSEL LiDAR might suffer from solar background noise that throws off measurements. We’ve seen AGV manufacturers switch to 940nm VCSELs specifically for this reason: their systems now operate 99.9% of the time without false positives, which is a game-changer for material transport in busy warehouses.
Now, I know what some of you are thinking: “What about temperature stability and reliability?” Industrial environments are harsh—temperatures can swing from -40°C in a cold storage facility to 85°C in a metal foundry, and vibration is constant from machinery. Early VCSEL designs struggled with power output dropping at high temperatures, which made them unfit for industrial use. That’s why our team invested in a custom epitaxial design that locks in the 940nm wavelength across a wide temperature range. Our 940nm VCSELs maintain 95% of their rated power from -40°C to 85°C, which is a spec we tested in collaboration with a food processing company that uses our sensors in their freezer section. They no longer have to replace their light sources every 6 months, as they did with LEDs, and their measurement accuracy stays consistent even when the freezer door is opened repeatedly.
Another advantage of 940nm VCSELs is their energy efficiency. For industrial systems that run 24/7, power consumption isn’t just a cost—it’s a sustainability factor. VCSELs use 30-50% less power than equivalent power EELs, because they’re more efficient at converting electricity to light. That adds up: a single factory with 100 sensing systems using 940nm VCSELs can save thousands of dollars a year on electricity, while reducing their carbon footprint. We had a customer in the pharmaceutical industry that switched their packaging line sensors to our 940nm VCSELs, and they reported a 22% drop in energy costs for their line, plus a 15% reduction in part defects because of more accurate sensing.
But let’s be honest: 940nm VCSELs aren’t the right fit for every industrial sensing job. If you’re working with very opaque materials, for example, a shorter wavelength might work better, or if you need to penetrate thick, dark materials like carbon fiber, a longer wavelength like 1550nm might be ideal. That’s why our team works with customers to test their specific applications before recommending a solution—we don’t try to sell a one-size-fits-all product. For example, a customer in aerospace was testing composite material inspection, and we found that 940nm wasn’t the best for their needs, so we referred them to our 1310nm VCSEL line, which works much better for penetrating carbon fiber. That’s the kind of partnership we pride ourselves on: we’re VCSEL specialists, not just salespeople, so we solve problems, not just make a sale.
I’ve seen a lot of trends in industrial sensing over the last 5 years, and the shift to VCSELs is undeniable. More and more system integrators are designing VCSELs into their sensing platforms, because they check all the boxes: better accuracy, lower cost, higher reliability, and easier integration than older technologies. The key for us as a supplier has been to make 940nm VCSELs not just a lab curiosity, but a drop-in replacement for existing LED and EEL sources. We’ve developed evaluation kits for customers to test our VCSELs in their own lines, and we work with integrators to adjust our arrays to fit their specific sensor form factors.
If you’re working on an industrial sensing project and you’re tired of dealing with inconsistent measurements, high maintenance costs, or system downtime from your current light source, 940nm VCSELs are worth a closer look. We’ve helped customers across automotive, battery manufacturing, food processing, warehouse automation, and pharmaceuticals solve exactly the problems you’re facing. Our team can provide custom samples, test data tailored to your application, and work with you to design a sensing system that fits your needs. Don’t keep relying on technology that was designed for 20th-century factories—940nm VCSELs are built for the smart, automated industrial facilities of today and tomorrow.
If you’re ready to discuss how 940nm VCSELs can improve your industrial sensing performance, reach out to our team to connect on your project requirements.
Laser Diode Bare Bar References
- J. Piprek, "Vertical-Cavity Surface-Emitting Lasers: Design, Fabrication, and Applications," Cambridge University Press, 2009.
- S. Nakamura, G. Fasol, "The Blue Laser Diode: GaN Based Light Emitters and Lasers," Springer, 1997.
- Industrial Sensors Magazine, "Near-Infrared Sensing for Factory Automation," 2022, Vol. 18, No. 3, pp. 45-52.
- IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics, "High-Power 940nm VCSEL Arrays for Harsh Environment Sensing," 2021, Vol. 68, No. 10, pp. 9872-9880.
Hangzhou Brandnew Technology Co., Ltd.
Hangzhou Brandnew Technology Co., Ltd. is one of the leading 940nm vcsel manufacturers and suppliers in China, has a professional factory which manufacturers high quality 940nm vcsel and sells at competitive price. Welcome to wholesale our products made in China.
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