Glowee: Electricity? Like I Care!

 Have you ever heard about lights working with bacteria? Well now it exists! That’s what Glowee, a French start-up, –yes, French people can be innovative! –, has created. This newbie yet future game changer was founded by two brilliant and young women (about 25 years old): Sandra Rey and Maëlle Chassard, with the help of Karim Kotobi and, later, of Gilles, a biologist. The story begins in 2013 when they take part into the contest “Prix Artscience 2013” and win the prize. They took as a starting point the fact urban lighting is local councils’ #1 expense. In order to end this situation, they looked at ways to produce light without electricity. And thought: “why not by taking advantage of nature”? A few organisms have the magic ability to illuminate themselves: that’s bioluminescence. You can do something with that!

How is that even possible? They managed to create bioluminescent stickers with microorganisms living in them. They are encapsulated in little bubbles where there is everything they need to survive: a liquid where they can enjoy their life and as well as food of course. This lighting is especially intended for shop windows. They decided to start their company and named it “Organight”. They changed the name later on for Glowee, which is rather sexier and easier to remember, don’t you think?

Credits: Glowee (official website)

Then, oh boy, things escalated quickly for the two co-founders. In less than two years, they awoken many people’s curiosity and appealed a lot of partners, including Google. Not bad! And as if it weren’t enough, they also won the Parisian session of the Elevator World Tour (last January, less than a month ago). This contest is held in 9 cities so far, with 100 start-ups in competition in each location. It consists in delivering a one-minute-speech about your start-up, in a famous elevator. The French session takes naturally place at the Eiffel Tower. Eventually, they won the contest and thus earned $100,000 of investment!

The Glowee team celebrating victory @Elevator World Tour, Paris January 2015. Credits: La Tribune

Why go for these stickers? It reduces your electricity bills and light pollution for everybody, since its luminescence is close to a night-light or a candle. Moreover it is a great opportunity for your brand. Yes because you are now a formidable environmental-friendly and responsible brand. And people look at your window even at night, which improves your visibility. Plus you get to choose the shape of the stickers you want! Oh and did I mention the whole things is transparent in the day light so people can still see what’s behind your window? Of course there’s also a very valid argument: it will prevent you from being a bandit. That’s right, a law of July 2013 in France forbids shop windows lighting at night.

Okay I might a bit over-enthusiastic for this start-up. Let’s talk about the drawbacks: the biggest one to me is green. Yes there is only one color so far and it’s fluorescent green. And I don’t like green at all. But let’s talk about other more objective issues: how can they be sure to always find enough raw materials? They make the living organisms breed in their lab. Thus, wouldn’t there be a time when they might have too many orders for too few raw materials? I’m not sure these living things multiply that fast… And if they do, they might lack space to actually store all these organisms. Another key issue is the lifespan of such stickers. The first prototype will last only 24 hours.

Though, I guess all these questions are being answered right now, while Glowee is undertaking a 6-month-lab session.

There’s actually a reason I am writing about this today. The start-up really needs to be in demand and deserves to be known. Glowee first products will soon be on the market, around July 2015. Their goal is to supply whole commercial streets so that 1 street lamp out of 5 can be removed. Imagine all what we can gain from this, starting with a better respect of the environment and a reduction in lighting expenses. Though they’re not restricted: they are looking at many other opportunities including roads, airports, areas where there is no electricity …

We will definitely hear more about this so far really successful start-up!!

A summarizing video:
https://vimeo.com/115693812 



Further reading:
http://www.glowee.fr/
http://www.lefigaro.fr/entrepreneur/2015/01/24/09007-20150124ARTFIG00013-cette-start-up-vous-eclaire-grace-a-des-organismes-vivants.php
http://www.latribune.fr/start-up/20150123trib68d49fdda/elevator-world-tour-glowee-la-start-up-gagnante-de-l-edition-parisienne.html