Welcome to the LEDs Magazine News & Insights newsletter for July 15, 2020. We had a Zoom meeting yesterday of our Strategies in Light advisory board. It’s really amazing how well such virtual tools work, although I missed seeing everyone in person. As always, the board meeting was an incredible learning opportunity with many of the brightest minds in the LED and solid-state lighting (SSL) sectors participating.
I can tell you that Strategies in Light will have an incredible program next year. You could probably guess that we will have great presentations on connected lighting. But I think Strategies in Light will lead the industry forward in a move toward connecting building systems. Our event has always set the pace in lighting for health and wellbeing, and in 2021 will begin to bring clarity in terms of standards.
As for content this mid-week, we have an interesting case study for you from the University of Washington. Cree Lighting has supplied an SSL project in the Dempsey Indoor Center — an indoor athletic facility. The project will generate significant energy savings and the sports teams will enjoy better lighting. Of course, we have to get back to a point where such sports teams are active and that may take a while yet.
In our most recent end-of-the-week missive, I mentioned that the ams acquisition of Osram had closed. I had been prepared for other obstacles to interfere with the closing just given the rocky nature of the entire deal that our Mark Halper has pursued tirelessly. Well, there may be issues yet. I don’t have the grounding in such merger and acquisition activity to understand whether some problems might persist. But Halper has written about some stock transactions that on the surface seem strange.
In new products, we posted a press release from Acuity Brands in our Company Newsfeed that covers new reflector technology for downlights. The concept is surely novel. The reflector bends opposite what you might expect approaching the aperture. The intent is elimination of glare and really making the area around the aperture appear dark. I look forward to seeing the design in person — someday.
I did wonder if my friends at Acuity had checked the dictionary before naming the product/technology. It’s referred to as a Hyperbolic Ceiling-Reflector. Reading that in the press release sent me to a couple of dictionaries and the primary definition of hyperbolic was what I thought it was and a connotation that’s not overly positive. Alas, I forgot some of my long-ago math training and the fact that there is a math definition of hyperbola.
You will find many more stories of interest in the body of today’s newsletter. 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]