Philips Light Up The Festival of Lights

Philips Colour Kinetics LED connected lighting transforms the banks of the River Rhone.

Philips Lighting collaborated with French artist Severine Fontaine, to create the centre piece for the 2014, Lyon Festival of Light. The world famous Festival of Lights in Lyon, France is the world's principal creative lighting display event. This year the show ran from the 5th-8th December.  

The six minute, centrepiece show, spanned 80 metres of the River Rhone's banks. The phenomenal centrepiece, named "Incandescence" celebrated the importance of light in human development. 

"Incandescence" took six years to create, it featured nine illuminated domes, shaped like incandescent light bulbs.Each dome was the size of a small family car. The six minute show explored the symbiotic relationship between the human race and light. The iconic incandescent light bulb was used to represent the historic relationship between humans and artificial light, exemplifying it's often forgotten impact on human development. 

"Incandescence's" co-creator, Severine Fontaine said: "I chose to work with Philips, which is a prestigious partner, providing high-quality and high-tech products that enable spectacular light effects. The Philips technology allowed me to explore and create emotion, working light with great delicacy as if it were a musical score. Philips provided more than just products, the team also bought passion that allowed me to realize my concept and light scenario in optimal condition for the artistic quality of the art work."

Philips' Light at the Museum Pilot Study

The Dutch National Museum for Science and Medicine was home to Philips' landmark pilot study for connected lighting mobile apps. Findings from the study indicated that 7 out of 10 museum visitors would like to receive location relevant information via their smartphone.

Philips, the global leader in lighting, hopes this innovative mobile app for connected lighting will provide a template for use in museums, hospitals and supermarkets in the not so distant future. 

The exhibition is part of a pilot project for Philips' LED based connected lighting systems for indoor positioning. The connected lighting systems use Visual Light Communication (VLC) technology. The exhibitions luminaires are placed in a positioning grid, they are individually identifiable and communicate with the camera's sensors in smartphones and tablets. Each light fixture in the grid communicates by blinking at high frequencies undetectable to the human eye, information relevant to the patrons location within the exhibition is transmitted through these fast pulses. VLC transmits data one way only meaning users personal data cannot be accessed by the connected lighting app. 

Upon arrival at the museum, visitors were given a tablet with a pre-installed app, the app contains a variety of multi-media content relevant to various locations within the exhibition. As the visitor moves around the exhibition, the individual light fixtures act as positioning beacons transmitting their location to the tablets camera sensor which trigger the apps content at various locations.

Visitors completed a short survey after their museum tour, the findings indicate that;

67% of visitors liked the fact that the tablet automatically provided additional relevant information at various information points

63% of visitors said that the tablet made the visit to the exhibition more enjoyable and interesting

50% of visitors under 50 years old said they would visit museums and exhibitions more often if there were tablets available to provide additional information or to guide them around a special route

Dirk Van Drift, Director of the Boerhaave Museum said: “We now know that offering a location aware and interactive experience encourages people to visit our museum more often. What is also really exciting and innovative is that we were able to achieve this by using energy efficient lighting, giving us a double advantage.”

The “smartphone generation” (those under 50) said they were open to trying connected lighting mobile applications in a number of settings. Almost 50% of all visitors claimed they would like to receive location-based information and use way finding services offered via the app in hospitals, shopping centres and supermarkets.

Jella Segers, from Philips Lighting said: “The survey findings show that we need to think of lighting differently. Lighting has gone beyond mere illumination. We can now deliver great quality and highly energy-efficient LED lighting that acts as a positioning grid to deliver targeted information, enriching people’s experiences of the places they visit, whether it’s a museum, supermarket, airport terminal or any large public indoor space.” 

Light, Beyond Illumination- Coming Soon To A Streetlight Near You

Industry giants Philips and Ericsson have teamed up to create streetlight columns with integrated mobile broadband. It is hoped this innovation will allow telecom operators to harness the infrastructure of the existing streetlights to expand and strengthen their data networks.

If the project comes to fruition, telecom gorgon Eriksson will be able to rent the space within the lighting columns to mobile operators.

Philips’ CEO, Frans van Houten said: the technology offers cities a more energy efficient and safer urban area. This new connected LED streetlighting model is another example of us bringing the Internet of Things to life, and demonstrates the capabilities of light, beyond illumination. 

Philips unveil their Sensor-Ready system for connected office lighting

Philips’ Sensor-Ready system uses LEDs which are powered over Ethernet; the system provides building owners and facility managers a plethora of useful data about their properties.

After the positive feedback Philips received about their Li-Fi system for retail stores, the Dutch conglomerate unveiled this clever indoor lighting solution for the office.

At the Light +Building show in Frankfurt, Germany, Philips proudly displayed their connected office -lighting system. The system’s LEDs are wired up to the buildings IT network, power is provided by the Ethernet which produces just enough juice for low power LEDs, the system can also include sensors for monitoring humidity and temperature, as well as for judging when a room is occupied or not.

Similar to Li-Fi, the lights can also act as a positioning grid helping people navigate the office layout. The lights again are able to communicate through a downloadable smartphone app, the fixtures can track the user’s whereabouts and help recommend for example the nearest vacant meeting room. Using the app, staff are able to easily adjust the lighting and temperature of the room they’re in via Philips’ office lighting app.

This innovative system enables building owners and facility managers to measure occupancy levels and energy usage, Philips’ software displays these is an easy to read format ensuring consumers benefit from all aspects of the connected lighting system. Using information collected by the app, managers and owners can easily decide when certain area need to be heated, how often specific rooms need cleaning and which rooms need to be lit and when.

When asked about the benefits of this lighting system, Philips spokesman Menno Kleingeld said: “It’s gathering a large database of information for various fixtures for facility managers, to make their life easier.” He went on to discuss how in addition to the energy saving benefits, the system may also provide a security benefit by sensing when someone is in a room which should not be occupied.

For more information on this lighting system or for any further information on LED lighting products visit our website http://theledspecialist.co.uk/ or call the office to speak to one of our highly skilled sales team 0118 939 3218

Philips' Latest Brainchild: Connect Office Lighting Systems