Zumtobel Group Services and Land Securities Group PLC have turned three conference rooms into living laboratories to prove the value of connected lighting with data-based software services for customers.

The new business division of the Zumtobel Group, Zumtobel Group Services has started a joint demonstration project with UK’s largest commercial property company Land Securities Group PLC. Together the companies will explore the benefits connected lighting solutions bring to commercial buildings. Therefore they implemented connected lighting systems in three meeting rooms at the Headquarters of Land Securities in London.

Light quality, demands and trends in lighting as well as new technologies enabling data-based services (=Internet of Things) are topics relevant to both Land Securities and Zumtobel Group Services (ZGS) as well as their respective customers. The aim is to prove the value connected lighting can bring to the customer and how this concept benefits the whole building management.

“It has always been important for us to find ways to improve the performance of our buildings and provide efficiency savings for our customers.. We now want to go a step further and look beyond efficiency improvements and cost-saving measures.. With Zumtobel Group we have found a partner with whom we can jointly develop solutions which not only save energy but also improve the customer experience adding value to our buildings.” says Iain Trent, Engineering Director Land Securities Group PLC.

“We are excited to be on this journey together with a partner like Land Securities and appreciate the trust they have in our future-proof solutions.”, says Thomas Knoop, Executive Vice President Zumtobel Group Services.

Meeting rooms turned into innovation rooms

In their Headquarters in London, Land Securities turned three of its meeting rooms into living laboratories, each having its own lighting concept and aiming to show the different control possibilities and  improved user experience. The role of Zumtobel Group’s new division ZGS is to provide the solutions and expertise and manage the system maintenance and data services to facilitate space management and remote monitoring.

The new Headquarters were equipped with SLOTLIGHT linear luminaires as well and PANOS Downlights supplied by Zumtobel. The lighting system in the three innovation rooms is controlled via LITECOM, a lighting management system provided by Zumtobel Group Services which also enables various data services. “LITECOM is our platform to connect the lighting world with its demand for robust, instant and affordable communication to the IT world where we turn data into relevant information and value for our customers. At the moment, LITECOM works with existing DALI installations. Due to its open software architecture, it will in future also support new technologies like Power over Ethernet (PoE) without having to undergo a system change.” explains Thomas Knoop.

Innovation rooms with three different approaches

In the words of Neil Pennell, Head of Engineering and Design, Land Securities Group PLC: “The concept of the innovation rooms is to provide an experimentation area within our own office space where we can trial new workspace technologies before we deploy them in our customer’s buildings. Working in partnership with Zumtobel Group Services to test and develop their new lighting concepts, which both optimise energy consumption and gather useful data about how the space is utilised to improve the customer experience, is a great example of true innovation in action,”

In the first of the three rooms a lighting system with modern LED luminaires that have a built-in radio module has been implemented, which can e.g. save up more than 50% of energy without having to interfere with the existing installation. For the second approach, shown in the Human Centric Room, the partners implemented LITECOM controlling the tunable white luminaires. Here the focus is on increasing the people’s productivity and well-being through lighting. The third approach can be experienced in the connectivity room. With intelligent sensors – in this case with the digital zoning presence detector ATIVO – the lighting system reacts to the way the meeting room is being used, and adapts e.g. to discussion or presentation scenarios. The occupancy data is collected, analysed and visualised on a cloud-based dashboard that has been co-developed between Bosch Software Innovations and Zumtobel Group Services. The user-friendly interface allows e.g. facility managers to understand and optimise space utilization. Conference rooms, for example, that are not being used for meetings can temporarily be used as office space.

Zumtobel Group Services bundles all services of the Zumtobel Group

Under the ZGS (Zumtobel Group Services) brand the Zumtobel Group offers a wide range of services – not only providing light contracting and consultation on intelligent lighting controls and emergency lighting systems, but also meeting the growing demand for project management of turnkey lighting solutions from a single source and a comprehensive technical & maintenance service. These offerings are joined by new, data-based services such as the Landsecurities conference room-use analyses.