Luminus Devices Inc., a maker of light sources for the TV and display industry, said the $72 million raised in a new round of financing will allow it to expand its Phlatlight LED chip sets into general lighting applications. The funding round was led by Boston-based Braemar Energy Ventures and included a number of other venture capital funds, Luminus said, such as CMEA Ventures of San Francisco and Paladin Capital Group of Washington, DC. All of the company's previous investors also participated. Luminus said the $72 million will allow it to accelerate product development and expand its high-brightness solid-state lighting into markets from commercial and consumer lighting to specialty applications such as medical, entertainment and homeland security. As part of that plan, Billerica-based Luminus said it is recruiting in the greater Boston area to increase its sales, applications engineering and product development staff and recently signed deals with two new distributors. Luminus Devices' PhlatLight LED chip set at 1 percent illumination. (Image courtesy Luminus Devices) "This investment enables a new phase in the growth of our company, and it will provide us with the resources to expand our product line, serve new markets and deliver the full value of our technology to our growing roster of customers," said Udi Meirav, Luminus CEO.The company's PhlatLight photonic lattice LED products are currently replacing traditional lamps in projection TVs and digital projectors, and the brightness of the LEDs is making the product a more cost-effective, environmentally friendly alternative to mercury-based fluorescent backlights in flat-screen LCD TVs, Luminus said. It demonstrated the PhlatLight BLU (backlight unit) at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas in January and said it will begin production later this year. For more information, visit: www.luminus.com or www.phlatlight.com