Signify Innovations India, formerly Philips Lighting, is hoping to regainbusiness levels seen before thepandemic owing to a surge indemand from the corporateand the government sectors.Requirements from officespace, retail, hospitality —pockets that were hit by the Covid hardest— are seeing tail winds in the private space.Fresh investments and contracts for public infrastructure in the government sector are seeing uptick. Put together, they would translate into a “strong double digit growth” for Signify, India’s largest lighting company, which is a global leader too.“We are looking at a doubledigit growth this fiscal. Firstfive months have been strong.

"We hope to cross the pre-pandemic level,” Sumit Joshi, vice -chairman and MD of Signify Innovations India, said.

Signify’s total income had fallen from Rs 2,919 crore in 2019-20 to Rs 2,516 crore in 2020-21 due to Covid. Even though the accounts are yet to be finalised for the last fiscal, the company is believed to have reached income seen before the pandemic in 2021-22 and it is set to cross the 2019-20 numbers in the ongoing fiscal. In 2017, the lighting and healthcare verticals of Philips were split and the lighting business was renamed Signify globally.

The company has lit up many major landmarkbuildings, edifices and placesof historical significance .Post pandemic, it is seeing more and more government institutions across the country opting for smart lighting to give makeover to existing structures while undertaking new projects, Joshi informed. Philips is a market lead-er in connected and smart lighting deploying Internet of things. A case in point, he pointed out, is Bund in Shanghai, where many buildings overlooking Huangpu river are conjoined by connected lighting.

In India too, the customers are seeking special light-ing recipes to commemorate particular events. “Lighting up places of historical importance is as much a matter of aesthetics as creating a safe environment at night for visitors and livelihood. We are looking at many new projects across states,” he added.

The company picks highway lighting as a large opportunity as well. Institutional business (B2B) accounts for 45 per cent of company’s sales while consumer space ac-counts for (B2C) the rest.

The consumer space

Joshi predicted a low double-digit growth in this space as it grapples with falling demand for traditional in candescent bulbs, even though relatively expensive LED lights are fast filling up the space. It has launched two brands in connected lighting ‘Philips Hue’ and ‘Philips Wiz’ at two different price points. Signify has also launched a new electrical brand, positioned in the mid-premium segment, named Ecolink. After launching lights two years back, it introduced fans. Joshi targeted a Rs 500 crore revenue by another 18 months by consolidating its positionin lights and fans segments before diversifying into other electrical products.