General Electric Lighting, a division of General Electric (GE), has stroke an agreement to acquire the LED lighting startup Albeo Technologies.The purchase will help GE boost its ability to offer all-LED solutions to customers, especially in the area of industrial lighting. "This acquisition is a big boost for GE customers moving aggressively toward an all-LED building envelope in new construction and retrofits, including retail, commercial and industrial high-bay applications," Maryrose Sylvester, president and CEO of GE Lighting, said in a statement.
 
Earlier this year, Albeo raised $8 million in a series C funding round. Albeo saw a 50% increase in revenue in 2011. Commercial and industrial sectors are moving more quickly towards LEDs than other sectors with a significant increase in sales for many players in the market. For cold storage and data centers, in particular, the payback is usually less than two years. Albeo works in one of the world’s 10 largest data centers to provide an all-LED solution.
 
"Some of our biggest customers told us they wanted a GE-quality solution for high bay," said Sylvester. "This acquisition accelerates our development of cutting-edge technologies that brings customers the energy-efficient solutions they need. That’s what customers get at the end of the day -- a refined, highly modular and scalable platform that delivers the GE quality they’ve come to expect."
 
For Albeo, the move to become part of GE allows it access to GE’s worldwide paths to market and huge research and development capabilities. The announcement comes at the same time GE released a report on the "Industrial Internet," which is essentially the networking of industrial machines, could add $10 to $15 trillion to global GDP.