Over the past few years, a privately owned Swedish health lighting technology company has grown its presence in the North America’s sports performance space.
Earlier this month, BrainLit announced its newest client — the Memphis Grizzlies.
BrainLit specializes specifically in biocentric lighting and offers potential lighting solutions to sports performance staffs to help improve player effectiveness.
BrainLit believes its strategy of replicating natural lighting indoors increases deep sleep, readiness, cognitive performance, and reduces staff sick days, among other benefits, to better sustain a healthy circadian rhythm.
The Swedish company currently has clients in several major sports leagues, including the NBA, NFL, MLB, and MLS.
"We are always exploring new and thoughtful ways to innovate and enhance the team and staff spaces inside FedExForum, and we identified lighting as an area we thought could be very impactful,” FedExForum VP of operations Dwight Johnson said in a statement. “BrainLit’s biocentric technology and its ability to deliver specific light recipes provided the ideal solution for us."
The Grizzlies join BrainLit’s list of professional sports teams that includes the NFL’s New York Jets, Indianapolis Colts, and Detroit Lions; the NBA’s Orlando Magic and Sacramento Kings; MLB’s Minnesota Twins and Toronto Blue Jays; and MLS’ Philadelphia Union.
BrainLit’s emergence in the North American sports space
BrainLit launched in 2012 by Swedish founder Tord Wingren, who is also one of the developers of Bluetooth. The company has its HQ in Lund, Sweden, and a subsidiary in the U.S. with offices in New York City.
Although BrainLit has grown its North American presence mostly through its professional sports portfolio, it’s a different avenue than the approach used in Europe.
For example, in Europe, BrainLit focuses primarily on health care and office-based companies. The company offers its lighting solution products across all sectors and hopes over time it can say the same about its North American presence long term.
“We identified early that sports could really help us drag the general market along and move quickly,” said Oliver Moorhouse, BrainLit SVP of business development. “They want the competitive advantage. They want to take care of the players.
"But we can also use the halo effect in the community," he continued. "If these high performance teams — that you have season tickets and boxes to for entertaining your clients — are using this, then it's a viable health and performance tool for your business as well.”
Moorhouse said BrainLit was referred to the Grizzlies by a private client of theirs in the Division 1 collegiate space.
He also noted that the ultimate “stamp of approval” BrainLit needs to become a partner for a specific sports team is from the performance staff, sports science department, and/or athletic training department.
“It's a very small world in that sports performance [space]. [The Grizzlies] did their due diligence, executed on the project, and then the partnership element was a secondary layer to create an even bigger impact for both organizations,” Moorhouse said.
How the Grizzlies could benefit from the BrainLit partnership
Moorhouse said BrainLit’s core package can provide up to 90% or more of the light needed for someone daily, and that can later be tailored to meet the needs of a particular person to create an even bigger advantage for them.
BrainLit refers to these specific plans as “light recipes.”
So, how does BrainLit measure success? That depends on the client.
“We have some clients who say perception is reality. And if the players or staff feel like this has given them a benefit, that's all they care about,” he said. “On the other end, we have clients who have done deep-dive biosensor data. … They're tracking their sleep over 30 days, and now some are tracking light exposure and light levels.”
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