The 16th Annual LightFair International trade show and conference once again offered an accurate snapshot of the state of new product development in the lighting business, the industry’s most pressing educational needs and macrotrends reshaping the always-evolving lighting market.
Attendance at the trade show, held April 12-14 at the Jacob Javits Convention Center, New York, was estimated before the event to hit approximately 20,000 attendees. With 1,500 booths, the number of exhibitors seemed to be up over last year’s show in Las Vegas. As in past shows, a dominant theme with most of the new products on display was to produce better quality light as efficiently as possible, and to control it with programmable digital controls. Many of the winners in the LightFair New Product Showcase focused on these tasks. (See page 2 for a listing of all winners.)
In the new product competition and on the show floor, lighting systems powered by light-emitting diodes (LEDs) were among the most popular new products. At the past few LightFairs, it seemed that much of the excitement about LEDs focused on the lamps themselves, which can last as long as 100,000 hours and dramatically slash maintenance costs. However, at LightFair International 2006, more LED fixtures were on display, as vendors raced to develop applications for this new technology. Steve Castellani, national specifications manager, FC Lighting Inc., a lighting fixture manufacturer based in Addison, Ill., said his company had a good jump on competitors in adapting its product offering to house LED lamps. FC Lighting launched its new line of JK Visions LED step lights at LightFair. Castellani added that once LED lamps can produce consistent white light at an attractive price, they will replace many conventional lighting systems.
Many LEDs are manufactured in Asia, and the number of Asian suppliers of LEDs and other lighting components may have hit a new high at LightFair 2006. They were marketing their wares primarily to established lighting manufacturers that want to lower production costs.
While some exhibitors were shopping for low-cost production alternatives at LightFair, lighting reps were at the show floor shopping for new lines to represent. Although the stated intention of LightFair is to showcase the latest in lighting products and systems to lighting designers, architects and other end users, one lighting rep said much of the activity at the show was actually reps hustling from booth-to-booth to add to their product offerings. LightFair International 2006 will take place May 30-June 1, 2006 in Las Vegas.