Cree Brings Highest Reliability to Broadest Family of Metal COB LED Designs

Cree, Inc. (Nasdaq: CREE) announces an expansion of the XLamp^® High Current LED Array family with new CMT LEDs that extend Cree’s latest metal-based chip-on-board (COB) LED technology to the most prevalent COB form factors. In addition to providing up to 45 percent more lumen density and up to 17 percent higher efficacy, all Cree^® XLamp High Current LED Arrays feature an innovative metal substrate technology that delivers higher reliability than competing metal COBs. With more than 6,000 hours of LM-80 data available, the expanded family of LEDs enables lighting manufacturers to immediately upgrade their designs for DesignLights Consortium^® and ENERGY STAR^® eligible applications, such as track, downlight and outdoor lighting.

"With the new High Current CMT LEDs, Cree has given us a full portfolio of solutions for our upcoming luminaire designs, in terms of both performance and ease of integration,” said Shawn Keeney, technology manager, Ledra Brands, a manufacturer of innovative, specification grade LED lighting fixtures and systems. "By choosing Cree, we know that we are leveraging the highest performance and best long-term reliability for COB LEDs to continue our leadership in solid state lighting design.”

The CMT LEDs and the recently announced High Current CMA LEDs make Cree’s new metal-based COB technology available in form factors that are compatible with most commercially available holders and optics in the market. The newly expanded High Current LED Array family (CMA and CMT) join Cree’s industry-leading Standard Density and High-Density families (CXA and CXA2), which creates the industry’s broadest portfolio of COB LEDs. COB LEDs mount directly to a heat sink without a separate circuit board, simplifying the luminaire manufacturing process and reducing system cost.

"Cree is a long-standing leader in developing reliability and lifetime standards for LEDs, such as IES LM-80 and TM-21, and we remain fully committed to upholding these methods,” said Dave Emerson, executive vice president and general manager, Cree LEDs. "In light of recent reports of some companies falsifying lifetime data, our customers can remain confident that Cree LEDs, including our latest High-Current COB family, undergo rigorous testing to allow them to consistently deliver reliable long-term performance.”

The CMT LED family includes 10 LEDs across three (9.8 mm, 14.5 mm and 22 mm) light emitting surface (LES) sizes to address a wide variety of applications. Featuring Cree’s EasyWhite^® bins, the XLamp CMT LED arrays are available in 2700K-6500K CCTs with standard color options of 70, 80 and 90 CRI and premium color options that include high fidelity (98 CRI) and specialty color points. Product samples are available now and production quantities are available with standard lead times. Please visit www.cree.com/cmt to learn more.

About Cree

Cree is an innovator of Wolfspeed^™ power and radio frequency (RF) semiconductors, lighting class LEDs and lighting products. Cree’s Wolfspeed product families include SiC materials, power-switching devices and RF devices targeted for applications such as electric vehicles, fast charging, inverters, power supplies, telecom and military and aerospace. Cree’s LED product families include blue and green LED chips, high-brightness LEDs and lighting-class power LEDs targeted for indoor and outdoor lighting, video displays, transportation and electronic signs and signals. Cree’s LED lighting systems and lamps serve indoor and outdoor applications.

Please refer to www.cree.com for additional product and Company information.

This press release contains forward-looking statements involving risks and uncertainties, both known and unknown, that may cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated. Actual results may differ materially due to a number of factors, including the risk that actual savings and lifetimes will vary from expectations; the risk we may be unable to manufacture these new products with sufficiently low cost to offer them at competitive prices or with acceptable margins; the risk we may encounter delays or other difficulties in ramping up production of our new products; customer acceptance of our new products; the rapid development of new technology and competing products that may impair demand or render Cree’s products obsolete; and other factors discussed in Cree’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including its report on Form 10-K for the year ended June 25, 2017, and subsequent filings.

Cree^®,XLamp^®, and EasyWhite^® are registered trademarks of Cree, Inc. DesignLights Consortium^® is a registered trademark of Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnerships, Inc. ENERGY STAR^® is a registered trademark of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

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