Syracuse company to light up its second Super Bowl
U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis will host Super Bowl LII between the New England Patriots and the Philadelphia Eagles on Feb. 4, 2018. (Provided photo)
Syracuse, N.Y. -- A Syracuse LED lighting company is on a Super Bowl roll.
Eaton Corp.'s Ephesus LED sports lighting business is about to light up its second Super Bowl - and the first of three straight.
The LED lighting that will illuminate Super Bowl LII Feb. 4 between the New England Patriots and Philadelphia Eagles at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis was designed and sold by Eaton, a power management company.
Employees work in Eaton Corp.'s Ephesus LED lighting business headquarters in Barclay Damon Tower in Syracuse on Jan. 25, 2018. (Rick Moriarty | rmoriarty@syracuse.com)
In 2015, the Patriots defeated the Seattle Seahawks in Super Bowl XLIX under Ephesus LED lights at University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Ariz. It was the first NFL championship game played under LED lighting and helped the company sell its lighting system and controls to many other professional sports facilities.
"Our success at University of Phoenix Stadium and the attention our LED lighting solution received for its performance during the world's biggest sporting event truly changed the perception of LED sports lighting from a rookie to a primetime performer," said Mike Lorenz, president of Eaton's Ephesus Lighting business.
"At that time, just a handful of professional sports venues and only one football stadium had made the switch to LED lighting. Today, more than one-third of the four major professional sports venues and thousands of other facilities of all sizes employ an LED lighting solution."
Eaton says its LED lights allow building operators to completely darken a stadium, turn on lights with the flick of a switch and display colorful light shows. Unlike the metal halide lights they are rapidly replacing, LED (light-emitting diode) lights require no warm up, are extremely energy efficient and require almost no maintenance.
U.S. Bank Stadium opened in 2016. It is the first NFL stadium built with LED lighting. Others have been retrofitted.
This will be the first of three consecutive Super Bowls that will be illuminated by Eaton. Super Bowl LIII at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta in 2019 and Super Bowl LIV at Hard Rock Stadium near Miami in 2020 will also be illuminated by Eaton.
Electrical engineer Joe Casper and his wife, Amy, founded Ephesus Lighting Inc. in Syracuse in 2010. Eaton acquired Ephesus in 2015, but the business has maintained its offices in Barclay Damon Tower in downtown Syracuse.