Who hasn’t found themselves in a windowless classroom, office, shopping centre or hospital, where the only light is both artificial and unpleasant? The two creators behind ECHY, Florent Longa and Quentin Martin-Laval, both became all too familiar with situations like this during their time at Paris’s Ecole Polytechnique university. That’s where they came up with the idea of creating an innovative solution to bring sunlight into windowless buildings – making significant electricity savings along the way. The concept involves solar collectors on the outside of buildings, which concentrate natural light. Fibre optic cables then transmit this light inside the building to light fittings in the rooms where it is needed.

This natural lighting solution, which brings the benefits of natural light to all, won over voters at the 2014 EDF Pulse Awards, where it was chosen as the winner of the ‘Home’ category. And it seems that their intuition was right – the startup then raised €1.5 million in 2015. The perfect way to accelerate their development even further – so let there be (natural and UV-free) light!