IKEA GreenTech has injected capital into Scottish technology company Design LED Products to help with the delivery of its IKEA Group Sustainability Strategy ‘People & Planet Positive’.
The initiative is aiming to allow customers to save energy and live sustainably at home. People & Planet Positive was introduced in 2012 and has the three key focus areas of: more sustainable life at home; becoming energy and resource independent and creating a better life for the people and communities.
New investment Design LED Products has developed a way of embedding LEDs into clear resins and films to create ‘light tiles’. IKEA GreenTech says the tiles are thin, flexible and low cost.
With LED lights using 85 per cent less energy than traditional incandescent bulbs, IKEA is planning to switch its entire lighting range over to them by September 2015.
Christian Ehrenborg, managing director at IKEA GreenTech, comments, ‘This technology opens up fantastic possibilities for innovative designs using energy efficient LEDs.
‘The partnership is a clear fit for IKEA and our goal to make living sustainably affordable and attractive for millions of people.’
Set up in 2008 by the Swedish flat-pack furniture business, IKEA GreenTech has a primary focus on the European Union area and has an agenda to invest in companies and funds that will help IKEA to ‘deliver on its sustainability strategy’. Other businesses to have secured investment include Swedish-based energy management company Exibea and Dutch waterless dyeing venture Textile Systems.
Commenting on the investment in his Livingston-headquartered business, Design LED Products CEO Stuart Bain says, ‘This strategic investment allows Design LED to significantly accelerate plans to deliver highly-differentiated products to an international market desperate to conserve energy, and hungry for exciting new form factors in LED lighting.’
Joining IKEA GreenTech in the deal are Design LED Product existing investors Scottish Enterprise, Strathtay Ventures, Tricap Ventures and Highland Ventures.
