ROCHESTER, VT – Advanced illumination (Ai) has announced that Joe Smith has been named director, operations and engineering and John Merva has joined Advanced Illumination as executive vice president, sales and marketing.

Founder and CEO Bill Thrailkill says, ‘‘Advanced illumination is pleased to announce these appointments. Ai’s growth has resulted in the need for increased strength and depth in both our operations and sales efforts. These moves support both our short term needs and our long term growth strategies.’‘

Smith says, ‘‘I am pleased to take on an increased role at Ai where I can focus on supporting customers and our staff as part of a more responsive organization.’‘

Merva says, ‘‘Advanced illumination is unique in its ability to provide a one stop shop for customers machine vision lighting and imaging requirements. The capability of our design and manufacturing team are second to none. I look forward to bringing this capability to our growing list of customers.’‘

Founded in 1992, Advanced illumination is a machine vision lighting firm owned and based in the United States. With over 15 years of business experience Ai’s capable team supplies off-the-shelf machine vision lighting solutions or can design and deliver a custom imaging system. Advanced illumination offers over 50 stock products with variations in color and optical capabilities resulting in over 30,000 distinctly different products. Ai’s capable application engineering and sales staff stands ready to provide imaging solutions for customers located both domestically and internationally.