Josh McKenna
Lighting manufacturers have typically grown their businesses in one of two fundamental ways: organically from within or by an external merger or acquisition. The catalyst for the most recent cycle of mergers and acquisitions over the past 15 years was the introduction of LEDs into the lighting market.
With such a disruptive and unknown technology, many companies opted to get into the LED game by acquiring existing LED businesses. The first of these notable realignments occurred when Philips Lighting acquired Boston-based LED company Color Kinetics in late 2007. Philips had already acquired LED chipmaker Lumileds in 2005 and TIR Systems in early 2007. With this addition to their portfolio, it gave Philips, primarily known as a lamp company, the ability to transform its business and growth at a system level. It also set in motion a similar set of acquisitions, as other legacy companies such as Cooper Lighting sought to add LEDs to their portfolio. Cooper would go on to acquire io Lighting, also at the end of 2007, and then later would be acquired itself by Eaton in 2012.
But some companies like Ruud Lighting ventured to establish their own LED business units. Ruud’s BetaLED, in time would become attractive to LED companies who were looking to add the missing component of luminaires from their businesses. Cree acquired Ruud Lighting/BetaLED in 2011.
Once companies had added LEDs to their portfolios, they looked next to add lighting controls, drivers, and sensor companies to their lineups. For example, Acuity Brands acquired eldoLED, an LED driver company in 2013 and Distech Controls in 2015.
Mergers and acquisitions have been a common theme over the course of the lighting industry’s history. The ebb and flow of the business landscape is a complicated one, and it is guaranteed that as lighting technology and business condition continue to fluctuate, there will be other iterations of this complex business process in the years ahead.
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