You could say Nigel Duncan saw the light when he was invited to become chief executive of STG Aerospace in 2013. The Northern Irishman – who had held a series of senior executive positions with aerospace suppliers in the USA over the past quarter century – joined a company known for its photo-luminescent floorpath lighting and other emergency signage but began taking it in an entirely new direction – into LED cabin mood lighting.
The UK company had been a pioneer in emergency floorpath lighting, developing the technology originally for submarines and nuclear installations, but moving – after the 1985 British Airtours crash at Manchester airport highlighted the need for more effective signposting of escape routes – into aviation. It was the first company to have a photo-luminescent system certificated in 1995 and today, STG’s saf-Tglo range is used by more than 300 airlines operating over 10,000 aircraft.
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By the time Duncan joined the Norfolk company, initially as a consultant, it was looking at diversifying into LED cabin lighting. With thousands of in-service airliners factory-equipped with flourescent equipment, he sensed a major opportunity in retrofit. “No one had really been talking lighting and asking what’s going on,” he says. “The industry hadn’t been paying enough attention to the interior environment. We felt crew and passengers deserved better.”
Duncan realised there was expertise within STG to create a new type of product. “We looked at what we had and brainstormed around the company – the key was not holding back on ideas,” he says. “We realised we were a lighting expert, but we were only competing in the regulatory segment.” There was also market demand, he says. STG spoke to some 100 airlines and discovered a lot of interest in an LED range – “so long as we kept it simple, retrofittable and didn’t invade the aircraft”.
The first retrofit for STG’s liTeMood range was on Swiss Avro RJ100s, followed by Thomson Airways Boeing 737s and 757s. Since launching the line – which comprises overhead, sidewall and now a reading light – STG has completed 12 installations on 50 mostly Boeing narrowbodies. STG is showing the new reading light at AIX, with the claim that its “square light pattern minimises the light spill onto neighbouring seats and gives passengers a sense of control over the own environment”.
Benefits
Aside from its aesthetic benefits – STG insists even airline food looks better under LED lighting – the message is that the technology is greener and more economical. “A flourescent tube gets replaced every year. Our lighting lasts a lifetime,” says Duncan. “Lighting is the most cost-effective investment you can make – it’s well sub-$100,000 to transform your aircraft, and you are in the three- to four-year payback range. Not to mention that a more relaxed passenger boosts your retail sales.”
Duncan says a retrofit of a 737 lasts just 5h, with installations taking place during standard maintenance layovers. “There is very little downtime involved,” he says. So far, the company has focused only on the retrofit market, leaving a possible push into the supplier-furnished equipment or factory-fit arena until “we have built a brand based on a high penetration of retrofit”, says Duncan. “We want to go back to the airframers with millions of proven flight hours.”
Despite its successes in mood lighting, the regulatory segment remains STG’s bread and butter. The company – whose competitors in emergency floor lighting include Lufthansa Technik – has an impressive market penetration, says Duncan, with a 100% share on all new Boeing 737NGs and the backlog for Max aircraft. It is also an option on three new types: the Embraer E2, Irkut MC-21 and Comac C919.
That is not to say this rather more commodity business does not have room for an aesthetic appeal. The company has already developed coloured and patterned versions of its saf-Tglo products to match an airline’s branding, and at Hamburg will demonstrate the latest addition – the first blue-glowing photo-luminescent emergency floorpath marking system. The colour, it says, “creates a more calming ambience”.
STG is ever keen to project its innovative credentials. In March it held an open day at its innovations and engineering centre in Cwmbran, Wales, opened in 2015. The facility includes chemistry and flammability labs as well as sections of an Airbus and a Boeing narrowbody, used to demonstrate its products. Says Duncan: “Being at the cutting edge of research into how lighting affects people, psychologically and physiologically, is central to our product development philosophy.”
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Source: Flight Daily News
