Signify

This article details Signify, the world leader in lighting headquartered in the Netherlands. The interview is with Anne Jancic, Global Segment Manager for vertical farming at Philips Horticulture LED Solutions.

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Could you give a little bit of an introduction of Signify?

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Signify is the global leader in lighting, with a team of 35,000 people and sales exceeding seven and a half billion euros. Our business spans various sectors, including LED lighting for offices, streets, municipalities, homes, and a division dedicated to agriculture. This division covers lighting for fish breeding, poultry, and horticulture, whereas the last one focusing on LED lighting for greenhouses and vertical farms across a range of crops, from vegetables and soft fruits to floriculture and cannabis.

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How significant is the horticultural lighting business within Signify?

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The horticultural lighting segment is a relatively small part of our overall business but seen as one of the growth engines.

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Could you talk about the upcoming objectives and challenges for the company?

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Philips has been a well known brand in horticultural lighting since 85 years, especially in LED lighting for horticulture since more than 15 years. We’ve seen the horticulture sector growing and contributed to a big extend towards its transition to LED lighting. When we look to the greenhouse sector, we might say that the biggest challenges of today’s growers are labour availability and the energy prices, especially in Europe, where we’re trying to support them with intelligent dimming solutions. For the vertical farming sector, our challenges mirror the general market challenges. The industry is transitioning from a phase of optimism to realism, with more critical evaluation of business cases by investors. A key challenge is proving the viability of these business cases. We support companies with our lighting products, business advice and extensive research, not only in lighting but also in plant growth and cultivation. We always strive to stay ahead, anticipating future developments. 

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What are the success factors for companies in vertical farming?

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Generally, we’ve seen a couple of basic requirements that made vertical farms stay or fall over the past years: their level of crop knowledge, experience in food processing/ operations, how well they could organize their sales channels and how they bagged up their business financially. 

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Looking towards the future, we expect that vertical farming will develop towards a strong, mature industry where producers, suppliers and chain partners will collaborate more closely. This collaboration will be essential to speed up the development of digital, intelligent and energy efficient cultivation methods, automized production systems and innovative product/ market combinations that provide real added value to industrial customers and consumers. 

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From a global region perspective, which areas are you focusing on?

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We're focusing on regions where vertical farming is a value adding part in the supply of fresh and healthy food towards consumers, mainly North America, Europe (especially the Nordics and Northwestern Europe, Italy), the Middle East, and parts of Asia. These are regions where we whether face extreme climate conditions where even greenhouse growing is tricky or where consumer demand for fresher, local and delicious food is the driving force.   is growing, like.

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What are some of Signify's future objectives and initiatives?

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Our key focus as a leading lighting company of course includes improving efficacy and energy management of our Philips Greenpower Production Modules, developing smart lighting solutions, and doing dedicated research on lighting effects on main vertical farming crops such as lettuce and herbs. But we go far beyond that. The complete control of the cultivation in a vertical farm does not only allow us to steer a crop on yield, plant architecture or shelf life, but also to influence its flavour and specific nutritional compounds. For instance, we succeeded in growing arugula with twice as much vitamine C or pak choi with more vitamine K. Crop wise, we’re looking into fruity vegetables and several berries as they are a pretty perishable product, but loved a lot by consumers, and some other ones that might be interesting for other markets besides fresh consumption. 

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Why is there so much interest in strawberries in vertical farming?

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Strawberries and other soft fruits are gaining interest due to their perishable nature, making local production more appealing. There's also a growing consumer fascination with soft fruits, and we're exploring crops with incredible flavour, higher nutritional value and personalized food options.

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What potential do you see for vertical farming in North America?

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North America holds significant potential due to unsaturated fruits and vegetable markets, a need for healthier diets, and varied climate zones. The region's large size and diverse climate conditions offer numerous opportunities for vertical farming.

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What are your views on container farms compared to larger vertical farms?

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We focus more on scalable R&D farms and larger-scale operations, as we can add more value through our research and the flexibility of our lighting modules. Container farms, while interesting, are not our primary focus.

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Can you elaborate on the role of far-red light in LED lighting for agriculture?

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Far-red light is an intriguing part of the spectrum, with varying effects on different crops like the elongation of a plant. Our research includes developing over 150 light recipes tailored to specific crops and quality specifications. We balance red and blue light, with far-red light sometimes playing a crucial role, depending on the crop.

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Are there any notable trends in the industry?

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A shift towards realism and standardization in technology is evident, which is beneficial for scaling up and achieving economies of scale. This goes hand in hand with innovative automation and digital technologies that help vertical farming companies to monitor and optimize their total company processes – from sowing to packaging, from order intake to stock management. There's also an increasing interest in diversifying beyond lettuce and herbs in vertical farming which cover crops like berries, fruiting vegetables like tomatoes or even grain. 

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Could you share some lessons learned during your tenure at Signify?

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The realization that market growth and project execution can take longer than expected is a significant lesson. Managing expectations is crucial as vertical farming is still a comparably new industry with its own dynamics, way of working and technology suppliers. Increasingly we notice more collaboration with the more established greenhouse sector on technology use and other experiences suppliers who are stepping into horticulture from out other industries. Despite the described challenges, there are successful examples in the industry an lot of positivity, indicating a trend towards more viable business cases, diverse business opportunities and thus a bright future.

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For those interested in learning more about Signify, where should they go?

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Signify offers their horticultural lighting products under the Philips brand. More information can be found on the Philips website.  (www.philips.com/horti), including blog posts, research, and product details. We also have social media channels, participate in fairs and events, and have a sales team for direct inquiries. Additionally, a 360-degree virtual tour of our Philips GrowWise research center in Eindhoven is available on our website.

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