Oklahoma City LED lighting company gives $500K for Ukrainian relief

March 30, 2022
Jasco Products splits the half million between two agencies supporting refugees and displaced people.

An Oklahoma City-based provider of residential LED lighting and smart home products is donating half a million dollars to Ukrainian relief.

Privately held Jasco Products said it is splitting the $500,000 evenly between two agencies, Samaritan’s Purse and Convoy of Hope.

Samaritan’s has opened two sites in Lviv in western Ukraine — an emergency field hospital on the edge of the city, and an emergency clinic at the train station, where thousands of women and children have been arriving on a daily basis as they flee their homes and the Russian invasion. The agency is also helping to supply food, water, hygiene, and medical support to refugees in Poland and Moldova. Convoy is working in eight countries including Ukraine and Poland to supply food , water, shelter, baby supplies, hygiene kits, medical supplies, sleeping mats, and other aid.

The heart of Jasco is with the people in Ukraine,” said CEO Jason Trice. “The stories of families being torn apart and innocent lives put in danger have compelled us to act as quickly as possible. We turned to our charity partners to see where we could make a difference.”

The number of refugees that have fled Ukraine since the war began on Feb. 24 has now exceeded 4 million, according to todays count by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). The number is roughly 10% of Ukraines prewar population.

Combined with the 6.48 million people that have been internally displaced, the number of people uprooted in the Ukraine is about a quarter of the population. The 6.48 million is the latest figure published by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), released on Mar. 18 for the period between Feb. 24 (the day the invasion started) and March 16. IDMC, based in Geneva, Switzerland, is part of the Norwegian Refugee Council, a nongovernmental humanitarian aid group out of Oslo.

Jasco’s contribution marks the latest in a number of efforts by the lighting industry to either speak out against Russia or assist in the humanitarian crisis.

Those have included a fundraiser spearheaded by news group EdisonReport; a call by Zumtobel CEO Alfred Felder for an end to the war; a matching fund campaign by ams Osram; and efforts by Signify to look into the lighting needs for refugees.

Jasco said it regularly donates 50% of net profits from its brands to causes such as food, water, shelter, and disaster relief. It partners with about 175 nonprofit organizations including the Salvation Army, Habitat for Humanity, and Water4. Two years ago the company donated $1 million for COVID-19 relief.

Jasco Products offers a wide array of indoor and outdoor residential LED lighting. Its own brands of lighting and other products include Jasco, Enbrighten, myTouchSmart, Cordinate, UltraPro, Power Gear, EcoSurvivor, Projectables, Lights by Night, Titan, and Uber. It also distributes GE- and Philips-branded LED lighting products.

_

How is the war affecting your company, and what humanitarian and business measures are you taking? Please let us know.

More on Ukraine/Russia from Endeavor Business Media brands

Electronic Design editor Alix Paultre speaks with networking executive about cybersecurity

UCLA Professor explores regional supply chain solutions for IndustryWeek

Military & Aerospace Electronics reports on Ukraine’s capture of Russian technology

MARK HALPER is a contributing editor for LEDs Magazine, and an energy, technology, and business journalist ([email protected]).

For up-to-the-minute LED and SSL updates, why not follow us on Twitter? You’ll find curated content and commentary, as well as information on industry events, webcasts, and surveys on our LinkedIn Company Page and our Facebook page.

About the Author

Mark Halper | Contributing Editor, LEDs Magazine, and Business/Energy/Technology Journalist

Mark Halper is a freelance business, technology, and science journalist who covers everything from media moguls to subatomic particles. Halper has written from locations around the world for TIME Magazine, Fortune, Forbes, the New York Times, the Financial Times, the Guardian, CBS, Wired, and many others. A US citizen living in Britain, he cut his journalism teeth cutting and pasting copy for an English-language daily newspaper in Mexico City. Halper has a BA in history from Cornell University.