Smart lights will become the largest iot consumer device in 5 to 10 years

Harshvardhan Chitale predicts that smart connected lights will be one of the biggest Internet of Things (IOT) devices in the next five to 10 years, as increasingly cheaper smart bulbs rapidly replace incandescent bulbs and compact fluorescent lamps (CFL).

"The next generation change in lighting is going to be more smart lights, which will become iot devices," Chitar said in a recent interview. "Smart lights will be one of the largest iot driven devices in the next five to 10 years." Smart lights are in an emerging phase, with a 5 percent market share in the country's lighting sector, and are expected to become the "default device" in the next five to 10 years, Chitar said. Smart Connected lights are the next generation of energy-efficient LED products with additional sensors to sense data such as temperature.

The LED lighting market in India is expected to grow at a CAGR of over 32% between 2015 and 2020, according to TechSci Research's recently released technology report titled "India LED Lighting Market Forecast & Opportunities to 2020". "Today, when we think about buying a cell phone, we don't think about buying a landline," Chitar said. By default, we think of a phone or smartphone. We expect that in the next five to 10 years, when people think about upgrading their existing lighting or installing new bulbs, they will choose to install smart lighting systems."

Chitar claims that India is ready to adopt smart lighting solutions on a larger scale. "We are a very tech-conscious economy," he said. If you look at the prevalence of smart hands in our country, we are now one of the largest markets in the world. Smart lights are essentially based on the same technological backbone. In terms of digital infrastructure, technology awareness and software development, we are always developing applications specific to India. So when we launch new solutions in India, in the four or five verticals I mentioned above (home, office, street and retail chain, etc.), there is rapid adoption and a lot of support for them."

Smart lights still account for less than 10% of India's national market share in the overall lighting industry. "But it's growing rapidly," Chitar said. Globally, in India, the number of smart connected lighting facilities is doubling every year. It's growing very fast, even though it started off a little slow."