Several Philips employees have recently received serious threats. These threats come from a former buyer of grow lights who wants to use the lights for growing cannabis. In the new policy of Philips, they no longer supply to intermediaries who use the lights for growing cannabis. The buyer was not happy about this.
Cause
Philips has stopped supplying the HPS grow lights to the customer because the buyer would clearly use the lights for growing cannabis. Two years ago, Philips decided that no more lights would be supplied if it was very clear that the lights were used for growing cannabis. The buyer was not very happy about this and decided to put pressure on the Philips employees to get the grow lights after all.
Threats
The threats mainly took place at the employees' workplace in Eindhoven. Later it went further and further, with some employees even being threatened at their home address. After these threats, the employees decided to make an agreement to deliver a batch of grow lights. When Philips refused to deliver the next time, the threats continued.
Possible consequences
There is currently talk of a ban on grow lights as a result of these incidents. How such a ban would be implemented and enforced is of course still unclear. It will be very difficult to ban lights that are also used in greenhouse horticulture for growing tomatoes. In any case, a ban on Philips grow lights would of course be a big disappointment for us!
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