Roleds shines bright at Asian Games and across the nation

Wang Zhongquan prefers to identify himself as an urban lighting designer and artist.

As the founder of Hangzhou Roleds Technology, a leading Chinese provider of intelligent lighting, he keeps pursuing cutting-edge technology in the sector and uses lighting design to enhance the temperament and ambience of urban spaces.

He said he was proud to see the lighting solutions of Roleds applied to diverse urban landscapes across the nation, especially in his hometown of Hangzhou, capital of East China's Zhejiang province. The city is hosting the 19th Asian Games that began on Saturday and runs to Oct 8.

Roleds has provided comprehensive lighting solutions for more than 10 landmarks and 500 buildings in Hangzhou and six facilities for the Asian Games, including the Asian Games Village and stadiums for table tennis, soccer and badminton.

"Hangzhou is trying to present a completely new experience in almost every aspect by hosting the Asian Games, including the industry my company is engaged in. That means illuminating the city at night will have a brand-new artistic and technological approach, which might bring some new inspiration to cities around the world," Wang said in a recent interview with China Daily.

The large number of projects posed a challenge for the company in spite of its extensive experience. However, Wang said he was confident that the lighting effects Roleds delivers would bring a touch of glamour to the city. For example, the Gongshu Canal Sports Park Gymnasium, the new venue for table tennis and break dancing, brings high requirements to lighting design, installation and debugging because of its irregular and elliptical shape.

"The gymnasium is shaped like a jade cong, a representative cultural relic. Our goal is to ensure that the external lighting system of the building provides uniform and flawless light at every position to make the 'jade' look perfect," Wang said.

Besides its lighting effect, Roleds has helped improve indoor anti-glare effects, which is critical for table tennis, he added.

Since its establishment in 2004, Roleds has undertaken outdoor lighting projects for many important events and cities domestically and internationally. Projects include the illumination solution for the Beijing National Stadium, also known as the Bird's Nest, during the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics. Another two are the China Pavilion at the Milan World Expo and Portland City Hall in the United States.

"We have multiple core technologies and patents, especially in terms of digital colorization, which have explored a broader spectrum space and discovered more possibilities of light in terms of colors," Wang said. "This not only brings more colorful lighting options to cities but also establishes Roleds' international leadership in this field of technology."

Bigger dream

While focusing on illumination solutions, the company has diversified its business into sectors including smart city solutions, and smart factories and robots, which will cover illumination chips development and new energy vehicle components in the near future, according to Wang.

Of them, the business of smart city solutions based on streetlight poles has demonstrated great market potential, he said.

Its streetlight poles have been made intelligent with information screens, broadcasting capabilities, high-definition surveillance cameras, environmental monitoring, projection lights, wireless charging, 5G micro base station interfaces and flexible solar modules.

Meanwhile, the company will accelerate its globalization process and layout, bringing lighting technologies and solutions to more overseas countries in the coming years, he noted. Recently, the company acquired a piece of land in Hangzhou and planned to make it a headquarters integrating all of the businesses in about three years.

"Our mission is to care for the world with light. We aim to be a leading global lighting technology enterprise and I believe Roleds will gain more recognition from the global market soon," said Wang.

chenhong@chinadaily.com.cn