Highly Scalable and Reliable,
the Decentralised Approach
to Lighting Controls for
Smart Buildings

Scalability – Whether it’s a small room or a building of thousands of lighting points, qualified Bluetooth Mesh can handle decentralised lighting control at scale.

Secure – Bluetooth technology uses a wide range of methods to protect the network from intrusion and multiple methods of transmitting and storing data.

Future Proof – Using over-the-air wireless tools, devices can quickly and easily receive software updates, ensuring they are up to date to meet the latest security needs and employ the latest available features. Furthermore, without any cables needed, this means that when the layout of a space changes (new wall or a moved wall, for example), there is no need to call in electricians to rewire, and by using mobile apps employing Bluetooth technology, you can simply reprogram. There is no need to involve a qualified engineer.

How Do We Apply This in the Real World?

Lighting has a unique set of features which will make it the backbone of the smart building.

Lighting is a powered infrastructure which is all over your building. This powered infrastructure owns the ceiling space and is the ideal structure which can be made to carry power to new sensors and services without the need to add new cabling. This enables a wide array of sensors to be easily and quickly distributed across buildings as well as create anchor points for hyper-granular, location-based services.

Lighting can easily be connected to other systems and to the internet using a wireless protocol such as qualified Bluetooth^® Mesh in order to acquire environmental data and provide service delivery.

Lighting has a location which is:

1. Shared with us human beings. We see them, and they see us. They can therefore understand the world we live in.
2. They have a location that does not change. As a fixed asset, we know the exact X, Y, and Z co-ordinates of each lighting device in the world, facilitating a grid of indoor navigation anchor points and enabling a wide array of new services for efficiency and wellbeing with minimal additional costs.

Using qualified Bluetooth Mesh, we can bring this unique feature set, starting with a powerful, multifunction sensor. Every single lighting point can be effortlessly given a set of capabilities, such as daylight sensing, motion sensing, onboard processing, data acquisition capabilities such as intra-luminaire driver power consumption or operating status thanks to DALI D4I, and more, making each and every single luminaire capable of having its own lighting control system. All this intelligence is simply inserted into a luminaire and connected by two wires, making the sensor easily replaceable and serviceable, encouraging best practices in circular economy and sustainable product design. We can take this incredible power and install it over a building with minimal effort and negligible disruption to occupants. With lighting controls built in and built on a qualified Bluetooth Mesh wireless technology, all the hard work is done at our factories, meaning that all there is left to do on site is to connect Live, Earth, and Neutral. It is no more difficult to install than a non-controlled lighting system. But now with exceptional motion coverage, granular control, and future-proof service capabilities.

Using intuitive mobile application tools empowered by Bluetooth technology and supported by web applications, implementation is quicker and easier than ever and puts the power to customise your lighting back in the hands of the owners of the lighting themselves.

Case Study – Boeverbos, Brugges, Belgium

Boeverbos in Bruges, Belgium is the regional government headquarters for the Flanders region of Belgium. The building is a mixed-use space comprising of offices, meeting rooms, circulation areas, canteen, and auditorium.

The client wanted a lighting upgrade for the entire building to improve the lighting quality and drive down their energy costs alongside a number of energy-efficiency measures employed on the site, such as Solar PV. The building had no pre-existing lighting control wiring which could be used to install DALI, and the client gave an aggressive four-week deadline to complete the work. Finally, the client desired a future-proof system so they could employ new services such as occupancy analytics, fault reporting, and central emergency lighting maintenance in the future when the budget allowed.

Feilo Sylvania, in partnership with installer Quintiens NV, part of the Veolia Group, installed 773 SylSmart enabled luminaires with qualified Bluetooth^® Mesh integrated into the whole building.    

Thanks to the many advantages of a decentralised solution based on qualified Bluetooth Mesh, the whole system was installed in three weeks, with commissioning undertaken by the installer at the point of installation rather than weeks later in two separate steps. This unique capability enabled whole-site installation with minimal disruption to the occupants and is all managed without the need for any central controller.

Qualified Bluetooth Mesh Combined with Lighting, Unlocking the Intelligent Building

By means of a lightweight edge gateway, a wide array of data can be acquired from lighting and be either converted to valuable insight from value-added services or exposed via API to augment other systems and make them more efficient based on the data acquired. For example, HVAC can be made smarter by not heating/cooling an empty room where no occupancy is detected. Or, perhaps, it could combine the data to make meeting booking systems more relevant by ensuring meeting rooms which are booked but not used are released immediately for reuse.