Advance Lighting Case Study

The Melbourne based manufacturer of energy efficient lighting systems, Advance Lighting Ltd contacted the Manufacturing Advisory Service (MAS) East Midlands for help to make the most out of new design and manufacturing software systems.

The UK’s leading manufacturer of bespoke, energy efficient lighting is already taking the retail world by storm after securing several large contracts for its own-brand tri-light LED products. And all this in an industry that it is thought will be worth £20bn worldwide by 2013.

During the past 12 years, Melbourne-based Advance Lighting Ltd has specialised in designing, manufacturing, distributing and installing lighting solutions for the point of sale, transport, retail and refrigeration sectors. Using its wealth of in-house expertise to diversify into designing its own products for direct sale to end users, Advance Lighting identified that it could double its business within the next 10 years.

Sales director Adam Hamilton-Fletcher said: “Two of the LED lines we’ve produced under the tri-light brand have already been accepted by three of the UK’s major supermarkets, with a large cash and carry business set to roll out the products in their European stores.

Advance Lighting contacted MAS for help to make improvements in the use and integration of manufacturing and design software being used to support the development of new products.

David Wright, MAS Adviser said: “It was a crucial time for Advance Lighting when they approached us as the company had a lot of expansion projects in the pipeline and it has been great to be able to help them. The 50% subsidised support we could offer under the MAS programme made a real difference in pushing the project forwards.”

“After our first meeting with MAS, it was immediately clear that they were very keen to help us with our development needs. This help effectively resulted in us being able to launch our own-brand products a lot earlier than would have otherwise been the case. This has helped us get an initial toehold in this market much quicker than our competitors.” Adam explained.
One of Advance Lighting’s new energy efficient LEDs is used in supermarket refrigerated displays. It replaces the need for standard fluorescent lamps which are 50% less efficient and do not operate effectively at temperatures below 5oC.

“We are very customer driven and energy efficiency is central to our business. Currently there is a lot of pressure on retailers to cut carbon emissions, so our new products help them by reducing energy consumption thanks to the technology we employ. Waste is also reduced with less maintenance required for the products,” added Adam.

Advance has doubled in size over the past three years and is currently looking at new premises where state-of-the-art production facilities will give the company the opportunity to develop its technology base further.

MAS in the East Midlands is funded by East Midlands Development Agency (emda).