Welcome to the LEDs Magazine News & Insights newsletter for Jan. 15, 2020. In our new twice per week format, this is our fourth issue of this newsletter this year and I suppose we can’t blame mistakes from this point forward on things being new. Feel free to email me your thoughts on our new schedule with this newsletter deploying twice a week, the horticultural newsletter twice per month, and the other vertical newsletters once a month. We’d be happy to hear about your thoughts on frequency and the days on which we deploy — Wednesday and Friday for this newsletter.
We’ve talked quite a lot about Strategies in Light of late. The event is just a month away. Our Carrie Meadows has posted a blog summarizing several of the sessions and events she has previewed. Also the Early Bird pricing has been extended to Friday but will close then. Procrastinate on registering and you will pay more.
Having had a few days to recover from my trip to CES, I find myself again wondering about the value of such mega-events. The problem is that you spend too much time trying to get to something you want to see. And then it’s hard to find someone knowledgeable to answer your questions. Frankly, I’m not sure how I thought I found such value attending CES and Comdex for a couple of decades. Maybe I was just younger and willing to put up with more. This was my first trip to CES in five years or so. I came home from CES not just tired but incredibly sick by the weekend.
Getting to news, there have been executive moves to start the New Year. The most notable is Neil Ashe taking over as CEO of Acuity Brands. It will be strange with Vernon Nagel not running Acuity. He was in place long before I ever covered the lighting industry. But he will remain on the board and hold a newly created position called executive chairman.
That story above also covered some other executive moves. And we also posted a story about Signify where Eric Rondolat will remain CEO for at least four more years, yet some other product and business management is changing.
We have yet another story about the ams acquisition of Osram and how the smaller ams will pay for the purchase. Meanwhile, I have had a chance to talk to a number of Osram employees in the past month or two. They are amazingly business-as-usual in their approach to work. They know that the deal will face regulatory hurdles in addition to the financing burden being felt by ams. Most don’t see any changes in their day-to-day operations until the second half of the year.
As most of you should know, we announced the finalists for our 2020 LEDs Magazine Sapphire Awards in both the product, technology, and application categories, and in our prestigious Illumineer of the year category last week. I know I have been promoting our Sapphire Awards event in every newsletter. But if you are going to be in San Diego for Strategies in Light this year, we have a special deal for you.
For $50 you can visit the historic aircraft carrier Midway. In addition to drinks and tapas, our guests will get to explore the museum and interactive attractions. And we’d love to have as many as possible join us to cheer on the Sapphire winners on the flight deck.
You will find many more stories of interest in the body of today’s newsletter. Please note my relatively new email address below. And always feel free to contact me to discuss content we post or to pitch a contributed article.
- Maury Wright, (858) 748-6785, [email protected]