LED Expo’s first post-pandemic edition witnessed a spectacular buyer turnout and strong business activity, becoming a platform to understand crucial changes that the business environment might witness in a post-pandemic world. The overwhelming business response led to over 75% re-bookings for the Mumbai edition in May 2022.
After the challenging phase of global lockdowns, the long-anticipated in-person meetings, live demonstrations, effective face-to-face discussions led to the strong business activity at the 22nd edition of LED Expo. Featuring more than 100 brands, the hybrid platform presented a comprehensive range of over 450 products on display and became a crucial meeting point for the industry attracting 7,911 on-site visitors over three days.
This year’s fair saw a strong convergence of domestic participants such as ACME Lighting, ALS (Innovative India Illumination), Aastha LED, CITI Lights, GEEP Industries India, Glow Green, Sri JSB Lighting, Lightberry, Hyance Electric, Optiks Mechatronics and Tata Communications, underlining the focus on bolstering domestic supply chains, strengthening domestic distribution networks and industry collaborations for local manufacturing.
Re-affirming the fair’s business significance for their product offerings for smart cities, industry giant Tata Communications’s Vice President – IoT India, Mr Praveen Arora stated: “It has been a wonderful experience being at LED Expo. The industry is growing significantly and it is further evolving with more automation as well as ‘LEDfication’. We have our own Make in India, Design in India and Expand in India initiative under which we have built the device development platform, application platform and we are also building analytics platform to provide meaningful insights for sustainable growth in India. The response from the visitors and the ecosystem across the LED segment, services segment and total solution providers was amazing.” Tata Communications has built a complete portfolio in smart cities, including smart street light controllers, smart sensors and utilities and the layer of analytics to monitor these devices and help in taking the right measures.
An exclusive report on ‘India Lighting Control System Market (2021-2027)’ unveiled by 6Wresearch at the expo indicated that the domestic industry is expected to grow at a CAGR of 21.7 per cent. Estimated to reach USD 8.2 billion by 2027, India’s LED industry is radiant with opportunities and needs a robust local business ecosystem to support this growth. One of the exhibitors at the show, Mr Aditya Malik, Director – Glow Green Energy Ltd, summarised the importance of LED Expo for the industry: “LED Expo has given a new beginning to the lighting industry after COVID. People are eager to explore new innovations and what’s new in the industry through this exhibition. The visitor response has been enthusiastic and far beyond what we had previously expected. Overall, our experience was fantastic.”
The new express entry registration format for business visitors and added hygiene protocols on-site ensured that exhibitors could focus on business. Visiting the show, Mr Mohit Sharma, Sr Vice President – Lighting & Appliance Business, Eveready, stated: “Kudos to the team for organising this exhibition! For a raw material supplier, the quality of crowd has been good and people are very much excited to come here. There are also several start-ups and emerging companies on the show floor, which is a really good sign for India and the industry. LED Expo has been successful in attracting businesses and the crowd at its venue once again.”
Connecting its virtual audience through a series of sessions at the virtual LED Summit supported by International Association of Lighting Designers (IALD) and event partner K-LITE Industries, the hybrid platform focused on important aspects of lighting controls in the design process, blue-light hazards as well as light pollution. While LED technology is known to be energy-efficient, increasing energy demands and rapidly declining natural resources require transitioning from a linear to a circular economy within the manufacturing processes which was also addressed during the session on India’s readiness to upgrade and reuse, or repurpose and recycle materials and parts when lighting products come to the end of their lifetime.
Targeting the financial centre, the next edition which is scheduled in Mumbai from 19 – 21 May 2022 at Bombay Exhibition Centre will lend further momentum for business-to-business (B2B) collaborations, partnerships and novel ventures for the industry. Over 75% exhibitors’ have already expressed interest or blocked their bookings for the upcoming Mumbai edition, which will target the western and southern regions. The overwhelming response and intense business activity signify a huge demand even in the current market scenario and sector players are ready to capitalise on domestic opportunities. Mr Sunil Gaikwad, Director & CEO, Geep Industries India Pvt Ltd, said: “After two years of pandemic, this new edition of LED Expo was much needed. Different types of suppliers, OEMs, finished products and solution providers have converged at this exhibition which makes it extremely valuable for business. Even this year we have generated a lot of leads. We definitely are looking forward to participating at LED Expo once again.”
