Signify: Give us data access and watch your plants grow

There has always been some head-scratching involved with the lighting industry’s attempt to also provide information technology. Why buy internet-connected smart building and city products and services from a lighting firm? Aren’t there plenty of IT companies that already provide those?

And, if an end user does turn to the likes of Signify, Acuity, Fagerhult et al. for IoT systems, just how many of the constituent parts — sensors, wired and wireless communications gear, cloud data storage, and data analysis, for instance — should the lighting company provide?

There is no one answer.

Notably, however, Signify recently issued a press release providing clarity in one sector of smart lighting: horticulture.

With so many greenhouses already outfitted with climate control systems, temperature and humidity sensors, and data connections, Signify made it clear that it will avoid providing those devices.

Instead, it will work with the end user in ensuring that the LED lights in the greenhouse are connected to the existing IT network, so the greenhouse benefits from what Signify calls “data-driven lighting.”

“Growers want to work from one platform and one user interface,” said Kay Rauwerdink, program manager for Horti Data Driven Solutions at Signify.  “That’s why we are designing our data-driven lighting solutions to operate as much as possible on existing data platforms.”

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Photo: Many greenhouses already utilize climate control systems with sensors and databases. Tying into those can provide growers with a number of benefits, such as determining the right lighting scenario when the luminaires switch on at dusk. (Image used for illustrative purposes only and does not represent a Signify-supplied greenhouse.). Courtesy of LEDs Magazine

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