amBX – A trip down memory lane
amBX is a leader in sophisticated smart lighting and building software, creating dynamic experiences that meet the needs for improved wellbeing, data aggregation, advanced connectivity, human-centric lighting and energy-efficiency.
As amBX approaches its 13th birthday, we thought what better way to celebrate than have a look back at how the company has evolved over the years. As with any teenager, we’re no longer a small, subdued entrant on the market; we are a larger, more disruptive force with a wealth of experience under our belt.
amBX was spun out of Philips Lighting R&D department in 2008. David Eves and Richard Cole are the original founders and are still with the company today, as passionate as ever about the potential their software holds.
So, let’s cast our minds back to the year 2008, Flo Rida ‘Low’ plays on a loop on the radio (one of the most popular songs of 2008), Barack Obama was still relatively unknown to the world, and it was the year that everyone was watching Breaking Bad.
amBX was a new fresh-faced software company with a focus on the video game and consumer electronics markets, aiming to create dynamic experiences with lighting.
Behind the scenes - In reality, amBX was born in 2000 when the original patents and concept in Philips Research was established. In 2002 the amBX team invented AmbiLight TV, which is actually still sold as part of Philips portfolio today. In 2004, the amBX Gaming Products were launched by Philips, and the software that powered them remained the focus for the early years of the amBX spin-out.
2008 - amBX spun out of Philips R&D department.
In 2009 amBX signed the first licensing deal that achieved our vision of creating truly immersive experiences for gamers. Lighting, sound and even fans would react to content within the game, adding to the immersive experience. We quickly gained an international presence with gamers purchasing the solution in Norway, Germany, Portugal and beyond.
However, alongside this market, the company began to see potential within other areas as we continued to develop our software and realise the potential it held. The ambient XC professional lighting controller was launched for the entertainment and hospitality markets.
We started to break into the Entertainment market in 2011, completing an install at 8 Northumberland Avenue, London, with our new software-based solution, ‘Light-Scene Engine’. Light-Scene Engine is an efficient and powerful colour LED control system with unique capabilities. It enables light to react in real-time to sound, video, or even presentations, easily creating dramatic and immersive effects without programming and in real-time. Used by many businesses for hospitality venues, cinemas and outdoor digital displays, Light-Scene Engine has proven to be a successful solution to manage lighting in ways that were not previously possible.
In 2013 we were gaining some traction and being recognised by other technology players within the lighting market. We partnered with Cisco on the ‘Lighting as a Service’ project.
2014 saw amBX being chosen by US-based multi-national Molex as the software solution for their new innovative network system.
Continual development, a drive for constant improvement and a joint ambition towards success led amBX to launch SmartCore in 2015. SmartCore is a smart lighting control platform. Uniquely created in software, it takes intelligent lighting to new levels of capability, efficiency, and interoperability. It brings all the lighting sensor and data management functionality demanded by smart buildings today and, as an ever-evolving platform, is ready to meet the demands of the future too.
This vast step forward in the sophistication of the amBX software solution prompted them to sign up Molex in a major license deal in 2016. Molex developed their own product called CoreSync, and they partnered with amBX using SmartCore to power their solution.
The amBX SmartCore and Molex CoreSync solution was then deployed in our first joint project in 2017 as a PoE smart buildings solution.
The IoT transformation of the Georgia-Pacific (GP) tower in Atlanta was completed in partnership with Molex in 2018. Their CoreSync IoT platform and connected lighting solution was integrated with Johnson Controls building management system, creating a truly smart building. This allowed GP to achieve optimal integration, functionality, cost, and efficiency among the various systems throughout each floor – lighting, HVAC, audio/visual, and room scheduling systems. The future-ready technology enables GP to leverage the data for continued building optimisation. Find out more here.
Another joint venture with Molex saw the development of Powerhouse Brattørkaia, based in Trondheim, in 2019. This office building of the future generates twice as much energy as it uses. It won the Sustainability category in the 2020 Innovation by Design Awards and has a BREEAM ‘Outstanding’ accreditation. All data collected about light levels, lighting settings, and occupancy is fully available and used to control and analyse energy efficiency. To find out more about this project, click here.
2019 also saw the installation of SmartCore within Heanor Park Care Home, a new-build care home in Derbyshire and the eighth home in the Ashmere Care Home family. The 60 care beds are split over five ‘households’ offering general elderly residential care, specialist elderly dementia care, and five luxury suites. To read more about this project, click here.
2020 was a year like no other for many of us. However, amBX used this time to refocus, strategize, raise awareness, and generate leads - this has allowed us to grow stronger than ever before. Our third care home installation is now complete, and we have a strong pipeline of further care home projects planned; we partnered with major industry players such as Tridonic UK, started our own Smart Buildings interview series (and now have our own podcast), new licensees have been recruited, our team has expanded, our client won ‘Client of the Year’ at the Lux Awards 2020, and we have been shortlisted for the [d]arc Awards 2020! We are poised for major success within the smart lighting and smart building industry.
2021 - Emerging from the pandemic, there has been a lot of positive change at amBX. We have released a new version of SmartCore with extra functionality, features and tools, which has enabled us to offer additional solutions to our customers. It has also opened up new opportunities for collaborations, partnerships, new customers and projects. We recruited a new CEO, Phil Cross, as well as a Solutions Director, Jon Couch, who will join the senior team in leading the company forward in a new strategic direction.