September 1 2026, 6:00 am | BY Ricki Green | No Comments
As New Zealand heads into spring and longer sunny days, LUMO has added real-time sun and shade data to its national network, through a new partnership with sun mapping platform SunSeekr. The agreement will give brands an hour-by-hour read on sunlight conditions at every one of LUMO’s digital billboard locations across the country.
SunSeekr models the sun’s path against building geometry and terrain to calculate where light is falling at any point at any moment. Applied to LUMO’s locations, it produces a continuous solar profile for each site covering sun angle, direct exposure, shade transitions and the hours a screen sits in direct light.
The app launched in London in 2025 and has since grown to more than 350,000 users, reaching #1 in the UK App Store’s Lifestyle category. Its sunlight technology has already been used commercially by global brands including Aperol, which used SunSeekr to connect consumers with sunny hospitality venues across the UK.
‘Sunshine State’ is now available for Dynamic Creative Optimisation (DCO) builds and custom event triggers via programmatic deals. Buyers can set rules such as serving only when a screen is in direct sun, weighting delivery to the hour before sunset, or holding spend while a site sits in shade – a contextual signal tied to each individual screen rather than a single weather feed applied across a whole city.
Says Jack Plowright, LUMO’s GM of Platforms and Partnerships: “The value is in how specific this data allows us to be, and how effective DOOH is when it responds to context at the moment of reach. Weather data tells you it’s sunny in Auckland. That’s not the same as knowing a particular screen on a particular corner is in full sun for the next ninety minutes.
“An eyewear brand could switch to a lens-focused creative when the sun hits the billboard, a beer brand could shift to people enjoying a cold one in the sun, or a hospitality client could run a terrace message while a nearby venue is in afternoon sun, then change it as the shade moves in.”
Mo Dawod, Founder and CEO of SunSeekr, says the partnership brings a largely overlooked real-world signal into digital media: “Sunlight changes what people do. It influences where people walk, where they sit, how long they stay and where they stop for a drink. We’ve seen through SunSeekr how differently people behave depending on where the sun is actually falling, not simply whether the weather forecast says it’s sunny. LUMO is now taking that intelligence into Digital Out-of-Home”.
The data will also improve the progress LUMO is making in carbon emissions measurement. Screen brightness is one of the biggest drivers of energy use on a digital billboard, since high levels of ambient light increase the power draw needed to keep content legible. Knowing the solar conditions at each site lets LUMO model that relationship and report more accurate energy usage and emissions figures back to advertisers.
Adds Plowright: “This is part of a continued focus on giving brands better ways to reach people in a way that doesn’t just consider who they are, but what’s happening in the world around them.”