Alex Roscoe, Eric Eisele

Since 2014, GrowFlux has been perfecting a horticulture lighting system that combines connected spectrum tunable LED lights with sensors and cloud-based software. The lights and sensors are engineered to precisely deliver light to plants only when crops are using it most efficiently, saving energy and boosting yields in energy-intensive cultivation operations such as greenhouses and legal cannabis farms.

With an investment round closed and several patents pending, CEO Eric Eisele and Chief Technology Officer Alex Roscoe began marketing their $1,300 LED lights this past summer from their headquarters in ic@3401, a business incubator managed by Drexel and the Science Center.

“I think we are kind of at the cusp of the next frontier of agriculture,” says Roscoe.

GrowFlux’s sensors “have the potential to save tremendous amounts of energy in the greenhouse market as the industry is projected to consume upward of 2 percent of the U.S. grid energy in coming years,” says Eisele.

The technology is a no-brainer, Eisele says, when considering both the growth of greenhouse farming and the way climate change could impair the global food supply.

One of their R&D tactics has been to collaborate closely with universities that are on the leading edge of optical sensing technologies.

“For example, we are translating this fascinating technology out of Cornell University into one of our sensor products that accurately detects very minute light signals from plants,” explains Eisele. “We can actually detect plant stress in real time.”

The groundwork for GrowFlux was laid over many years in Drexel’s College of Engineering and at the duo’s early jobs in Philadelphia. Before GrowFlux, there was Summalux, an LED lighting-related startup Eisele began as an undergrad with Drexel engineering Professor Adam Fontecchio. After he exited, Eisele worked in product development at a Philadelphia architecture firm. There he met Roscoe, who was doing his co-op and had wireless sensor experience stemming from an extracurricular project with Kapil Dandekar, an engineering professor and associate dean at Drexel. After Roscoe graduated, he worked at Comcast Corp. as a wireless engineer — until the “stars aligned,” allowing him to join GrowFlux with Eisele in early 2018.

“Is it cheesy to say we are trying to transform agriculture?” Roscoe muses, to which Eisele didn’t hesitate: “Our sweet spot is data plus light and there’s tremendous opportunity there.” — Lauren Hertzler