Time Line Services N.V.

Lighting up the Caribbean

Business View Magazine interviews Sjors Beeks, Owner/Managing Director of Time Line Services N.V., for our focus on Best Practices in Caribbean Business

Based in Oranjestad, Aruba, Time Line Services (TLS) are specialists in connected lighting for the Caribbean region, and the preferred source for intelligent and high-quality light sources in project lighting. As a lighting specialist and Value Added Partner of Signify – the world market leader in lighting with global brands such as Philips, Philips Dynalite, Color Kinetics and Cooper Lighting, and the IoT platform Interact, as well as luminary and controlling devices – Time Line Services can offer engineering, system architecture and support to local contractors for the agile implementation of those systems.

Time Line Services was founded 15 years ago in the island of Aruba, as a technical consultancy and engineering firm. Since inception, they have offered MEP (Mechanical-Electrical-Plumbing) engineering and supervision services to government, commercial, and private clients, mostly in Aruba. In 2016, however, they had the opportunity to manage a Government initiated project with Signify (at the time named Philips Lighting). Recognizing the quality and robustness of the products and knowing the lack of good quality LED lighting in the region, Time Line Services became an official representative of Signify, which resulted in a Value Added Partnership with that company just a few years ago. This partnership has afforded TLS the tools to gain knowledge and insights in their light and light controlling systems, thus creating more business opportunities.

In addition, during this time of COVID, a lot of local governments have raised incentives for the growing of crops and greens. Vertical farming and horticultural lighting, delivering the right light for the plant at the right moment and place, could be a sustainable solution for incremental food production. Depending less on importation of these whole foods and significantly reducing the time from the farmer to the plate, which means better and richer food. From an active wellness perspective, Beeks notes, “During the last year people have (mostly unwillingly) practiced less sports than usual. Connected Sport Lighting could help people get slowly back to the sport courts again, of course, as far as allowed. Scalable and highly IoT controllable sport courts lighting, such as Interact Sports, gives clubs and federations the possibility to use the lighting in an efficient and sustainable way.” Through this system a reservation app can be connected, enabling the lights to turn on automatically and at the light levels the user has reserved for saving energy cost due to scalability.

Beeks acknowledges: “Globalization and urbanization are terms we hear a lot. The world has become smaller in a sense and people worldwide are moving to cities. With one push of a button, we can order almost any product wherever in the world. But what happens with our retail stores?” TLS and Signify have the solutions: fantastic lighting products to attract customers back into the stores, creating a special experience worth walking into. Extremely high energetic and colored products such as luminous textile from the brand Color Kinetics is one of the innovations which can give a retail establishment a very entertaining look. Beeks adds, “An indoor navigation lighting system can help to track, guide, and interact with customers through your store, making their shopping experience incredible. The products and systems are so versatile and scalable, which makes each project unique. We design and engineer every project with specific customer needs.”

Time Line Services are currently working on an exciting engineering project incorporating the latest IoT technologies in lighting (with connectivity to the building management system). The project is a new medical school campus being built by Sevier University in Aruba. When complete, they will have between 2500 and 3000 luminaires with their control system installed and it will be the largest project that TLS has done, to date.

Lastly, Time Line Services are working together with the project developer on a government initiated houses/condo project consisting of over 300 dwellings – basically creating a new urban community. Looking ahead, TLS is also planning on building a complete store/showroom for their own business, packed with all the latest technologies and lighting. Beeks shares, “In the near future, as soon as it’s allowed, we plan to travel to different locations in the region to talk to local partners, builders, developers and governments to give our support and offer our products, services, and knowledge in any way we can. And eventually they will be able to fly in to our showroom here in Aruba and see for themselves the newest and latest technologies that are available. The future is bright!”