Nanoleaf Light Panels

Key numbers

The product

Nanoleaf Light Panels are modular LED panels - triangles, hexagons, squares - that clip together into custom wall layouts and connect over Wi-Fi. Users design their own shapes, then control colour, scenes and music-synced animation through an app or voice assistants. The panels solve an expression problem rather than a functional one: lighting becomes wall art people want to photograph and share.

How they did it

Gimmy Chu, Tom Rodinger and Christian Yan built Nanoleaf on the side while holding day jobs. Their first product, an ultra-efficient origami-style LED bulb, raised $273,278 from 5,746 backers in 2013, and a 2014 campaign added roughly $193,000. That proof unlocked backing from Horizons Ventures and Kleiner Perkins. The decisive pivot came in 2016 with triangular Light Panels: instead of a hidden, forgettable bulb, they sold a display object customers photograph and share. That shareable framing drove global retail deals and a reported ~$40M acquisition in 2026.

Why it worked

• Pivoted from invisible utility to visible, shareable design
• Two Kickstarter campaigns proved demand to institutional investors
• Customers became marketers by posting their own layouts
• Expansion packs created repeat revenue