LichtWART: Let There Be Light – Sustainable Light

The startup LichtWART’s IoT solution ensures that illuminated advertising and outdoor lighting always shine with the right intensity and malfunctions are spotted at an early stage.

Karlsruher SC has made it to Germany’s senior soccer league, the Bundesliga, at least where sustainability is concerned. The new outdoor lighting at the club’s Wildpark Stadion akready fulfills the requirements of the new DFL Sustainability Guidelines in which the German Football League specifies the sustainability criteria that in the future will partly decide whether a club can play in the Bundesliga’s two top divisions.

Gütersloh-based declare, a company specialized in stadium advertising, is aware of the market changes. Due to increasing demand for digitization and sustainability in professional sport, declaro has opted in this pilot project for Herford-headquartered startup LichtWART’s dynamic lighting management. Both the XXL-sized logos of the stadium and the sponsor and the blue illuminated contour over 600 meters long that surrounds the Wildpark are now connected on the Internet of Things (IoT). Illuminated perimeter advertising is monitored via the Cloud and shines brightly as required, its brightness adjusting to the ambient light. That saves energy and cuts the cost of electricity; it also prolongs the life of the LEDs.

“With highly efficient advertising systems and control from the Cloud our customer is well equipped for the future,” says declaro’s Joschka Amtenbrink, in charge of further technical development of advertising systems. “On this project we had strict official requirements in respect of seasonal lighting. Without a Cloud-based solution reprogramming all of the systems would have required a very large effort.”

LichtWART also equipped HanseMerkur’s striking illuminated advertising at Dammtor Station in Hamburg with an IoT module – and did so retroactively. Thanks to automatic demand-oriented adjustment of light intensity the retrofit used 35 percent less electricity in the first ten months (about 6,000 hours) of operation. The system also reports malfunctions automatically and can switch itself off if a letter in the sponsor’s or the stadium’s name fails – in the interest of trademark or brand protection.

From the gas station via fast food chains to the movie theater, we see illuminated advertising daily on the freeway, in industrial areas or downtown. If you want to prevent your billboard from being switched off you must comply with strict light pollution requirements such as maximum light intensities or prevention of nondirectional radiation to protect local residents, including birds and insects, Illuminated billboards are designed to be in use for decades and many have been operational for a long time. Maintenance and repair of what is often still analog technology can prove expensive. As a rule, billboards have a timer and a dimmer, so monitoring, cleaning, repairs and adjustments can only be undertaken on-site manually. Defects and malfunctions often long go unnoticed.

“It really gets difficult if a missing – unlit – letter harms the customer’s image,” says LichtWART’s founder Gregor Giataganas. Defective LEDs might suddenly change KAFFEE (coffee) into AFFE (monkey). “The consequences of an outage could even be lost business if, for example, drivers on the autobahn fail to notice a service area in time.”

LichtWART aims to end all that by, for example, retrofitting analog facilities without major installation input, followed by remote maintenance and timely repairs – all based on the IoT. In 2020 LichtWART was founded as a subsidiary of Bertelmann, an SME that has designed, erected and regularly maintains around 2,000 illuminated advertising facilities all over Germany. In founding LichtWART the company seeks to remain futureproof by investing in the digitization of illuminated advertising. Bertelmann chose Tekekom as its digitization expert and partner. Telekom implements the digital networking of LichtWART solutions. Telekom’s IoT Cloud plays a decisive role by providing the light management platform.

There are safety aspects to outdoor lighting.  Well-lit entrances, siairs or sidewalks help make trip hazards and obstacles easier to recognize. Adequate lighting on parking lots and in underground garages reduces the risk of theft and vandalism. Appropriate lighting in parks and public places helps to prevent crime and enables people to move around more safely in the evening, while good lighting is indispensable in commercial and industrial surroundings to prevent occupational accidents and ensure employee safety.

Take, for example, Priwall marina near Travemünde. Three hundred lights along the pier and the jetties provide the harbormaster with enough light for his nocturnal control rounds. If a light fails, the LichtWART system notifies the operator automatically. Telekom supplied certified hardware, connectivity, SIM cards and, customized for LichtWART, a dashboard in its IoT Cloud. An external Lübeck Port Authority surveyor certified the overall system safety.

The Berliner Bogen in Hamburg was more a matter of appearances.  Across a distance of 140 meters the building spans a kilometer-long flood basin. An architectural highlight, it is an eyecatcher, especially at night. Three lighting systems make the entrance area, nearly 40 meters tall, shine brilliantly. The operator monitors the lighting remotely and with ease – thanks to the LichtWART module – by PC, smartphone or tablet. Repairs are carried out swiftly. The technician knows what the fault is before he sets out, so he can take the right spare part or parts with him.

“Managing and maintaining the three lighting systems is now much simpler, and if an outage occurs the repair is activated automatically without delay, with low process costs and low personnel input,” says Dennis Peizert, managing director of Hanselicht, the manufacturer of the Berliner Bogen facility during the project. The energy consumption tells a convincing tale: rhe smart solution cuts energy costs by up to 40 percent.

LichtWART has since fitted out all 13 locations of battery maker VARTA with new illuminated advertising systems. “The technology enables us to manage our illuminated advertising as optimally as possible and helps us to reduce maintenance and running costs,” says Fabian Stock, Head of Corporate Development. “Lighting malfunctions are also reported directly to the logo supplier so the problem can be solved without delay. The reduction in light pollution by intelligent control was another convincing argument for us.”