LED lighting pioneer moots AIM launch

08/02/2010 Robert Tyerman

PhotonStar LED, which produces eco-friendly light bulbs with a claimed life of 11 years, is considering tapping AIM investors for around £5 million to fund acquisitions, says chief executive officer James Mckenzie.

Based at Romsey near Southampton, the company, which physicist Mckenzie founded in 2007 with a Lebanese business partner, expects to increase turnover tenfold to £2.3 million this year, has been profitable since August and wants to expand its sales network by taking over ailing lighting companies and upgrading them.

‘We are looking at AIM very seriously,’ says Mckenzie, who suggests that one route onto the junior stock market could be by reversing into an already quoted shell company. Funded hitherto by management and business angels, PhotonStar, whose products are protected by 14 patents, is now engaged on the national launch of a range of lighting products, which he claims are 85 per cent more energy efficient than conventional lighting equipment and 40 per cent better than the present generation of low-energy bulbs.

Demand comes from private houses, supermarkets and other public buildings. The company, whose board includes financier and mining company chief Martyn Konig, also carries out energy-saving refurbishments for hotels and other buildings, helping to save money on maintenance.

‘We have not started yet,’ declares Mckenzie, pointing to a £1 billion lighting market in the UK alone. He concedes that there is one big competitor around, in the shape of electronics giant Philips, but boasts that ‘we usually win on price and performance’.

Observers suggest that Swedish and other companies have been casting acquisitive eyes on PhotonStar of late, but argue that the company has not encouraged them. If Mckenzie goes ahead, he should be well received.