Strategies in Light: Berrigan keynote will focus on the future of light

Feb. 3, 2010
Lighting designer will argue that lighting must move away from a commodity model to one where experience and green take center stage.

Kicking off the High Brightness LED Market track at strategies in Light, lighting designer Derry Berrigan will present a keynote entitled "Lighting's Intersection – Commodity or persuasive Technology?" Slated for February 11 at 9:00 AM, Berrigan will describe "what I think the lighting market should look like in 2030."

Berrigan has spent the last few years working closely with LED technology in lighting. The keynote will highlight her real-world experience with solid-state lighting (SSL) and the roadblocks that she sees blocking mass adoption. She said, "I'll describe how SSL is going to remake the industry in the right way."

In terms of industry goals, Berrigan is focused on lighting quality and energy efficiency. The ever passionate designer states, "We focus on bringing the art of light to everyday buildings. Light improves peoples' lives."

Lighting as a commodity is a concept that Berrigan feels is holding back the industry. She states, "Only price differentiates it if it's a commodity." She believes the commodity approach will leave lighting manufacturers dealing with smaller profit margins, and increased competition as "selling tonnage" is the only way to increase revenue.

Berrigan laments that lighting is looked at as a commodity today. But she argues, "Lighting is such a persuasive technology. It moves people. As a designer, I engineer an experience."

Berrigan will focus on both the experiential and energy efficiency angles in her keynote. She states, "We have to be ready to move into the experience and clean energy economy." She believes that the industry must deliver an 80% energy reduction in lighting energy alone by 2030.

Clearly, SSL will play a key role going forward. But Berrigan points out that the industry must take a holistic approach addressing lighting, controls, design, and daylight. Specifically on SSL, she believes the industry has delivered interesting prototypes to date. She asks, "For 2010, how do you build on the prototypes and get mass transformation and implementation."

See how Berrigan paints the future first hand. Strategies in Light 2010 is the longest-running and largest high-brightness LED and lighting conference. The conference is slated for February 10-12 in Santa Clara, CA.