Faces in vision: Casey Segraves of Smart Vision Lights
Business Development Manager at Smart Vision Lights
Founded 2007 in Muskegon, MI, USA
Trade shows and conferences serve numerous purposes related to business development, networking, and education, but one particular facet that we are going to focus on here is the ability to speak to industry colleagues face-to-face, and get to know one another beyond the ordinary exchange of phone calls and e-mails.
In our new Faces in Vision series, we are going to profile industry people from all over the world, in order to learn more about them, and to let our readers get to know them a bit more as well. This first one is with Casey Segraves, Business Development Manager, Smart Vision Lights, who helped us develop this idea.
What are three interesting things about you that people might not know?
I've played ice hockey since the age of three and still play. I practice a daily meditation ritual. I have my own health, fitness, and wellness blog www.adeptbeing.com (shameless plug).
What are your top three favorite movies of all time?
Office Space, Lords of Dogtown, and most recently Deadpool.
What are your top three favorite TV shows of all time?
That 70's Show, Entourage, and How I Met Your Mother.
What are three of your favorite bands or musical acts?
Pearl Jam, Foo Fighters and Seether.
What do you like to do in your free time?
Exercising, being outdoors, playing ice hockey, reading, and cooking.
How did you get into your field of expertise?
I was out of work, like many in 2007-2008 and my father, Bobby Segraves, granted me an entry-level position doing marketing and learning sales at the company he had just co-founded, Smart Vision Lights.
Why did you choose your profession?
I've always enjoyed all things related to business, marketing, and sales.
What do you like about working in your field?
I enjoy the camaraderie with those in the vision industry. It feels like we are all building and supporting the vision industry market together and some of the applications I see are truly amazing.
What is your company's core focus and mission?
To be the world's leading supplier of innovative, value-added LED illumination solutions for machine vision and beyond.
What are you most excited about at your company right now and why?
The new products we are about to release. They are extremely innovative value-added products that fill gaps in SVL's product offering. Not to mention, they pack quite a punch for such small form factors.
In what markets or applications do you see the most growth?
Traffic applications are something I'm being presented with more and more. Right now automotive is really thriving and biomed research is increasing, but flying under the radar.
How have market changes affected product or service development at your company?
SVL excels at listening to customer feedback. We are always "floating with the tide" of the vision market. We tend to let the market influence us based on its wants and needs and maintaining our flexibility. It has allowed us to bring impactful products to market while avoiding unsuccessful endeavors.
What is one particularly interesting way you've seen your product or service deployed/utilized recently?
We had a customer who use our SXP30 structured light to emit a line circle with center dot during the manual cutting process of whiskey barrel lids. This omitted the very time consuming process of measuring and using a guide to draw a perfect circle on the surface of the wood. The customer could project the pattern on their boards, place their cutting tool, and cut without spending the time and effort to measure and mark.