You’re not clear if you want to start an LED lighting retail business or LED lighting manufacturing company - two very different undertakings.
Starting an LED retail business is not difficult: identify a market for a particular product or product set, understand the quality / price points for this market. Find reliable suppliers for those products. Test those products independently otherwise you’re likely to be ripped off. Devise your marketing / sales strategy. Then off you go. Grow your product range as your business grows and as you spot the opportunity.
Starting an LED manufacturing business is a different kettle of fish. Let’s look at many of the Chinese LED factories:
Do they all manufacture? Not necessarily, many of them assemble only. Other factories manufacture everything for them and all they do is put it together. Many of them don’t even have QA instruments - they simply assemble and flog to the market, making great claims as to the quality, lifespan, even the brand of components (e.g. claiming a particular chip brand) but independent tests by yourself will often prove these as false claims.
Most if not all LED factories in China do not manufacture everything used in their lights: they often source packaged LEDs (from an LED chip supplier), they source bulb housings and bases, they source FPCs from an FPC manufacturer, they source castings from a casting company. The better (reliable, better quality control) LED manufacturers will in-source as much of the value chain as they can as this way they control the quality. All good LED factories have their own QA testing machines: goniometer, integrating sphere, water / moisture testing, lifetime testing, impact resistance, etc as well as quality engineers. As a minimum the electronics will be designed in-house by engineers, but equally the electronics will be built in-house - i.e. pick n place machines, reflow soldering machines, etc. The top LED manufacturing companies will often package their own chips.
Do they all manufacture everything they sell? Even if factories in China really are factories, many act as trade companies too - and offer products from partner factories to be able to offer their clients a complete product range. This could be a potential startup strategy for you too - start small and partner with other companies, and as you grow you expand your internal product manufacturing capabilities.
I believe the capital outflow for an LED manufacturing company can be quite high, especially if you want to be competitive, and offer decent quality products.
watch video here