7. Conclusions and Outlook
In this article, we explained how the lighting industry can benefit from IoT by moving from the traditional closed and proprietary systems to secure, extensible, interoperable and service-oriented systems. We presented an Internet of Light architecture, OpenAIS, designed to address the challenges while making this transition. An overview of the OpenAIS IoL architecture with a deeper look from different architectural perspectives has been provided. Additionally, a system solution explaining the design of a pilot system, with its configurations and design choices, has been provided. An analysis of the system by comparing it with a state-of-the-art commercial solution shows how IoL systems can exceed proprietary systems in several KPIs such as security, interoperability, extensibility and openness. A SWOT analysis of the OpenAIS system highlighting strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats is also provided.
The system analysis shows that despite careful design choices, the performance of the IoL is slightly lower than proprietary solutions. The transition towards IoT enables using/sharing the network infrastructure in the building instead of employing a dedicated network for each building services. Ensuring reliability and guaranteed performance of dedicated lighting networks in shared networks will be a challenge. The security and privacy of IoL is an issue not fully resolved. Careful monitoring of security vulnerabilities and updating to the latest security provisions are needed. To ensure privacy, strong policies and their enforcement for data storage and handling are needed. A careful study on the impact of IoL on various stakeholders and the changes it brings in to the lighting value chain and building sector need to be carefully analyzed.
