David Shiller

  2023 was another turbulent year in the Controlled Environment Agriculture (CEA) market. There was a surprising wave of bankruptcies in Q1, Q2, and Q3. Major players like Infarm, AppHarvest, Aerofarms, and Kalera all closed operations and filed for bankruptcy. The high-profile closures then contributed to funding drying up for CEA ventures, hindering new projects. [...]

On January 9th, 2024, DarkSky International officially launched the DarkSky Approved Lodging Program. DarkSky Approved Lodging is an overnight visitor accommodation with exceptional or distinguished quality starry nights and a nighttime environment preserved through on-site DarkSky Approved lighting. They include camps, seasonal campgrounds, hotels and resorts, retreat centers, properties promoting ecotourism, and astrotourism lodges that [...]

  I had the pleasure of interviewing Brian Lintner, Industrial Design Manager and Michael Miller-Riley, Senior Product Manager-Lighting, both from Hunter Fan Company. Look out decorative lighting industry, Hunter isn’t just ceiling fans any more. Hunter Lighting is growing and making moves. Shiller: Hunter recently released seven lighting collections and one ceiling fan collection as [...]

  CES 2024 concluded last week, in Las Vegas, NV. While every imaginable type of tech was there, there were some lighting product releases. Here are two of them: NanoLeaf released its Sky Expansion Pack. See first two images. This NanoLeaf Skylight is designed to look and feel like a skylight. By replicating a dynamic [...]

  During the Summer of 2023 back-to-school season, Walmart piloted sensory-friendly store hours, each Saturday from 8am-10am. During these hours, Walmart stores turned down the lights where possible, put a static image on the TV walls, and turned off the radio. Walmart received overwhelmingly positive responses. As a result, Walmart has now designated 8am-10am every [...]

  China’s near monopoly on rare earth metals production is diminishing, but still dominant. China’s market share of rare earth production has dropped from 97% a decade ago, to 70% in 2022. Rare earth minerals are critical to many important climate action technologies including magnets for renewable energy generation such as wind turbines, electric vehicles, [...]

  In 2020, I authored an article in LEDs Magazine alerting the industry to the misleading claims of all emergency TLED manufacturers (at that time), that their products were UL listed. Until now, all of the emergency TLED makers were getting emergency TLEDs UL listed as basic retrofit lamps under UL1598C (Type B), but they [...]

  The World Bank forecasted that 5.2% annual growth for China in 2023 will slow to 4.5% in 2024, and down to 4.3% in 2025. China’s growth has fluctuated dramatically in recent years, ranged from 2.2% in 2020 to 8.4% in 2021 and 3% in 2022. China’s economy is feeling the drag following severe pandemic [...]

  Here is a quick summary of 6 acquisitions in the fourth quarter of 2023: SpecGrade LED was acquired by LED Lighting, LLC. Details here. PE firm acquiring Progress Lighting. Details here. Hess GmbH acquired by Ragni Group. Details here. Fonroche Lighting acquired NoWatt Lighting. Details here.Eurofase Announces Strategic Private Equity Investment. Details here. Acuity [...]