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Agrotech, China, Company News

Yunnan will purchase 20,000 metric tonnes of Origin’s nutritionally enhanced corn

Beijing-headquartered Origin Agritech, an agriculture technology company, announced recently that the company and Yunnan Feeding Company have entered into a supply agreement, under which Yunnan will purchase 20,000 metric tonnes of Origin’s nutritionally enhanced corn (NEC).

Pricing will be based on the prevailing price of corn at the time of delivery but based on current market prices the deal would be valued at RMB3100 per metric ton, or RMB62 million in total ($9.2 million).

Origin had previously announced 50,000 metric ton supply agreement back in April of this year. The approximate combined value of the two orders is RMB217mm ($32 million). This backlog of orders does not include any impact from the previously announced collaboration with BaoDao Feed.

“It is quite gratifying to see the feedstock industry’s excitement and demand for our new corn variety, NEC,” said Dr Gengchen Han, Origin Agritech’s Chairman. “We are focussed on operations and ramping up production to catch up with the quickly increasing demand.”

Yunnan will purchase 20,000 metric tonnes of Origin's

Agrotech

The global agricultural drones’ market is expected to grow from $1.5 billion in 2019 to $10.5 billion by 2027, at a CAGR of 31.4 per cent during the forecast period 2020-2027

As per the report published by Fior Markets, the global agricultural drones’ market is expected to grow from $1.5 billion in 2019 to $10.5 billion by 2027, at a CAGR of 31.4 per cent during the forecast period 2020-2027. The North America region stands as a promising market for agricultural drones and is expected to grow at the highest CAGR of during the forecast period. It is also the largest market for agricultural drones. This is due to the high purchasing power and readiness in technological adoption of consumers in that region. North America is the fastest-growing, but South America has the highest potential for growth. 

Key players in the global agriculture drones’ market are Israel Aerospace Industries, Yamaha Motor, Delair, AeroVironment, PrecisionHawk, Trimble Navigation, AgEagle Aerial Systems, Microdrones GmbH, Agribotix LLC American Robotics, AgEagle Aerial Systems, URSULA Agriculture, Sentera, Parrot SA, SZ DJI Technology, and AutoCopter Corp among others. Key companies are mainly focusing on developing new products, forming partnerships, and joint ventures to gain significant market share in the global agriculture drone’s market.

The key driver of the global agricultural drones’ market is increased agricultural output. Higher crop yields and a better understanding of precision farming are raising demand for these drones.

The global agricultural drones’ market is expected

Agrotech, Start ups

CropTrails will help SatSure expand and strengthen its international market reach into its target geographies in Africa, LATAM and SEA

Bangalore based SatSure, a deep tech startup working at the intersection of spacetech, Artificial Intelligence (AI), and Software as a Service (SaaS) to drive decision intelligence, is pleased to announce the acquisition of SaaS application CropTrails, which was conceptualised and incorporated in the year 2018 by Indore-based startup OEPP Innovations Private Limited.

CropTrails is a web and android application designed to bridge gaps in the processes of farm management. The mobile application is used as an information collecting tool by the field officers or supervisors to record and digitise information about farmers, farms and crops. The application allows the users to monitor and control the crop cycle, track input usage like fertilisers, access weather forecasts, and track farm visits by the supervisors, among others. CropTrails also doubles as a field force productivity monitoring tool with in-built role-based user management.

This development comes in after SatSure raised $5 million in Pre-Series A funding in a round earlier this year. SatSure shall be transforming CropTrails into a no-code platform for IT teams of agribusinesses to rapidly prototype and build their in-house tool that can be easily integrated with SatSure Sparta’s datasets.

“Farm digitisation tools like CropTrails are necessary for countries such as Nigeria and the Philippines. It forms the first digital layers on top of which other services can be rendered. Thus, this acquisition will help SatSure expand further and strengthen its international market reach into its target geographies in Africa, LATAM and SEA. SatSure will also use the collected data and feed it into its proprietary algorithms to increase its learning rate as part of this deal,” said Prateep Basu, founder and CEO of SatSure.

CropTrails will help SatSure expand and strengthen

Animal Health, R&D

The Global Innovation Centre hosts more than 2,000 visitors a year

Cargill is expanding and renovating its Global Animal Nutrition Innovation Center in Elk River, located just 30 minutes from its global headquarters. Along with a facility in Velddriel, The Netherlands and the soon to be operating Changrong R&D centre in China, the Elk River site serves as a hub of the company’s global network of 15 animal nutrition research and technology application centres. These sites work around the clock to explore, innovate, and think ahead of customers’ challenges in navigating today’s complex and ever-changing environment.

The nearly $50 million investment will upgrade animal facilities including a new dairy innovation unit, construct a larger onsite feed mill, create a visitor’s space, and build a state-of-the-art laboratory for nutrient research and development. The Global Innovation Centre hosts more than 2,000 visitors a year. In addition, new viewing corridors will allow visitors to view the animal R&D facilities conveniently.

Adriano Marcon, Group Leader of Cargill’s animal nutrition business commented, “This is the largest investment Cargill’s animal nutrition business has made in innovation. We are taking a significant step towards what is going to create state-of-the-art technologies for our world. We want to be the best animal nutrition partner globally, and our customers expect us to bring innovations that make them more competitive, efficient, and sustainable. When they choose us as a trusted partner, they rely on us as a conduit to new technology. Therefore, we must be in the forefront and move faster to continue delivering on our promise to customers.” 

The Global Innovation Centre hosts more than

Agrotech

The permanent injunction restrains Udragon from manufacturing, using and selling any product which contains a specific patented intermediate chemical used to make chlorantraniliprole

FMC Corporation, a leading global agricultural sciences company, announced the Hangzhou Intermediate People’s Court in Zhejiang Province, China, granted FMC a permanent injunction against Hangzhou Udragon Chemical and Zhejiang Udragon Bioscience. The Court found Udragon infringed on FMC’s patent for a key intermediate chemical used in the manufacturing of chlorantraniliprole by conducting field trials, attending trade fairs and distributing samples of products manufactured using FMC’s patented intermediate.

The permanent injunction restrains Udragon from manufacturing, using and selling any product which contains a specific patented intermediate chemical used to make chlorantraniliprole, FMC’s leading insect control active ingredient.

Michael Reilly, FMC executive vice president, general counsel and secretary said, “The principles decided by the Court are also significant for future infringement actions where defendants attempt to rely on the so-called ‘Bolar exemption,’ a legal exemption in the pharmaceutical industry, to avoid infringement of valid intellectual property in the agrochemical segment.” 

FMC has invested heavily in the research, development and commercialisation of chlorantraniliprole, a proprietary, breakthrough technology designed to control a wide variety of destructive insects that can destroy a farmer’s crops and dramatically lower food production.

The company maintains an extensive patent estate for its proprietary chlorantraniliprole technology, including patents that cover active ingredient composition of matter, manufacturing processes, intermediate chemicals, formulations and other areas protected by intellectual property laws in the US, China, India, and other important agricultural markets throughout the world.

The permanent injunction restrains Udragon from manufacturing,

R&D

Ginkgo Bioworks will become a multi-year microbial strategic partner with Bayer in their work to develop biological solutions in fields like nitrogen optimisation, carbon sequestration, and next generation crop protection

Bayer recently announced that the company is pursuing an agreement whereby Ginkgo Bioworks will acquire Bayer’s West Sacramento Biologics Research & Development (R&D) site and internal discovery and lead optimisation platform. The contemplated transaction, projected to close before the end of 2022 pending final negotiation of the agreement terms and subject to regulatory approvals, would also bring Joyn Bio’s nitrogen-fixing technologies to Bayer, successfully closing the joint venture created between Leaps by Bayer and Ginkgo Bioworks in 2017.

Ginkgo Bioworks will become a multi-year microbial strategic partner with Bayer in their work to develop biological solutions in fields like nitrogen optimisation, carbon sequestration, and next generation crop protection.

The transaction will enable Bayer to expand its leading biologicals position, strengthen its access to key enabling technology in synthetic biology, and maintain Bayer’s role as the preferred research, development, and commercial partner in the biologics segment.

“Bayer’s work in the rapidly growing biologics space is an essential part of our commitment to sustainability and providing effective climate-smart products like nitrogen fixing and optimization technologies,” said Bob Reiter, Head of R&D for Bayer’s Crop Science Division. “Our work with Ginkgo will accelerate our biologicals pipeline by leveraging Bayer’s expertise in bringing reliable and effective biological products to market against Ginkgo’s synthetic biology research engine – now enhanced by an expanded ag biologics research and development platform – and help Bayer continue to expand our biologics product range to create tailored solutions for additional crops.”

This strategic shift to an exclusively external biologics research discovery pipeline with leading partners will activate the international open innovation ecosystem and equip Bayer to better leverage its proven capability in commercialising biologicals to create category-leading products that meet the growing need for climate-smart and sustainable options that complement traditional chemistries.

Ginkgo Bioworks will become a multi-year microbial

R&D

The areas of research will include Applied Natural Sciences, Specialty Chemicals, Agri-Chemicals, New Materials, and Sustainability.

BASF Chemicals India Private Limited (BCIPL) has signed an agreement with the Pune Knowledge Cluster (PKC), an initiative facilitated by the Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser (PSA), to launch WEnyan, a research scholarship programme for women in Maharashtra.

WEnyan is a holistic scholarship programme where women in leadership positions from scientific fields will play an active and important role in selecting, mentoring, and monitoring other women candidates in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math). As part of its Corporate Social Responsibility commitments, BCIPL will provide financial support for research projects, to women candidates from marginalised backgrounds in the state of Maharashtra.

These women will be selected by PKC. The areas of research will include Applied Natural Sciences, Specialty Chemicals, Agri-Chemicals, New Materials, and Sustainability. Through this initiative, PKC aims to increase enrollment and retention of women in scientific streams creating a more gender-equal workforce. Key beneficiaries of the programme would be women from marginalised communities and low-income groups in Maharashtra, who are either pursuing or have completed undergraduate degree or Master’s degree and want to explore entrepreneurship.

The areas of research will include Applied

Agrotech, Inputs

The company has achieved a historical milestone of 13,000th tractor roll out in FY’22, just two years after its grand Indian market debut

Solis Yanmar is one of the world’s leading tractor brands that delivers pioneering technologies for supreme customer satisfaction and remains synonymous with toughness, durability as well as performance. Following an extraordinary approach to ensure ‘Future is now’ for farmers, Solis Yanmar has proudly achieved a historical milestone of 13,000th tractor roll out in FY’22, just two years after its grand Indian market debut.

Since its inception, the flagship brand of International Tractors Ltd. has continued to capitalise on 100 years of Japanese technology to remain 100 years ahead and has been expanding its dominance in the toughest of advanced agriculture markets. Solis Yanmar already has been No1 tractor brand in 7 European countries.​

Speaking on the new milestone achievement, Raman Mittal, Joint Managing Director, Solis Yanmar, said, “It gives me immense pleasure to share that all our hard work over the last few years built a strong platform for us to achieve historical milestone of 13,000th tractor roll out in just two years of Indian market presence. Our joint venture with Yanmar continues to be fruitful and we are well positioned to capitalise on the 100 years heritage of Japanese technology and will keep innovating for 100 years ahead.”

The company has achieved a historical milestone

Agrotech

The company is offering its customers with Synergen DRT: the first solution to come out of our DropForward concept

One of the leading global suppliers of specialty chemicals for agriculture, Clariant has launched DropForward: a focused approach to providing precision application with adjuvants and co-formulants. The company is offering its customers Synergen DRT: the first solution to come out of our DropForward concept.

Synergen DRT, the drift control agent and biological activator specifically for drones. Developed in Clariant’s high-tech facilities in Germany, and under real-life conditions in Brazil, this high-performing adjuvant allows the application of standard pesticides under the low volume conditions of small drone tanks.

“Synergen DRT helps to control drift and volatility of fine droplets during application and helps improving the coverage and penetration of the actives in the leaves, boosting biological performance as well as making drone spraying more sustainable and environmentally friendly,” said Fabio Caravieri, Clariant’s Head of Marketing, Industrial & Consumer Specialties.

The new adjuvant technology has shown that with small doses of the adjuvant, a robust performance is obtained in the control of drift and performance, even when used with mixtures of products, and standing out in the desiccation of weeds, ensuring higher efficacy of herbicides.

The company is offering its customers with

Agrotech, Start ups

The start-up will use the funds to build out the product and accelerate business in targeted value chains

Bengaluru-based ag-tech start-up, Agrizy has raised $4 million in a seed round led by Ankur Capital. This round also saw participation from Omnivore and notable angels like Rajesh Yabaji (CEO, BlackBuck), Zetwerk’s Co-founders Srinath Ramakkrushnan, Amrit Acharya, Rahul Sharma, and Vishal Chaudhary among others.

The funds raised will be utilised to build strong business and engineering teams, develop a suite of digital services for the processed agri marketplace and ramp up customer traction in targeted value chains across various locations in India. The start-up will use the funds to build out the product and accelerate business in targeted value chains. 

Founded in September 2021 by Vicky Dodani and Saket Chirania, Agrizy is developing a tech-first platform to bridge the processed agri supply chain. The tech platform connects the processors and buyers of non-perishable farm products across both food and non-food categories like jute, oilseeds, cereals, pulses, and others to optimally discover and fulfill transactions.

This will support agri processors with innovative technology solutions, for effective utilisation to execute the trade through Agrizy’s logistics partners. The founding team comes with a good mix of operations, finance, and logistics experience at high-growth start-ups like Blackbuck, Bizongo, and Zoomcar, as well as deep ties to the agri processing domain. 

Vicky Dodani, Co-Founder, Agrizy, said, “We aim to be the single point of contact for the agri processing units by providing them an end-to-end fulfillment platform and simplifying their procurement and sales cycle. The recent round of funding from two notable funds investing in Agri Tech reinvigorates our vision of transforming the processed agri supply chain.”

Saket Chirania, Co-Founder, Agrizy, added, “There is a lot of untapped potential in the way agri processing units can leverage technology to grow and thrive. Agrizy offers solutions across digital vendor management, and supply and value chain automation to its Agri Processing Units. We are sustainably growing our business by 100 per cent MOM from inception.”

The start-up will use the funds to

Agrotech, Finance

The new fund will continue to invest in early-stage start-ups developing breakthrough technologies for agriculture, food, climate, and the rural economy

Omnivore, India’s leading agritech venture capital firm, announced that the launch of its third fund, with a target corpus of $130 million (Rs 1000 crore). The new fund will continue to invest in early-stage start-ups developing breakthrough technologies for agriculture, food, climate, and the rural economy. Omnivore generally invests in Seed, Pre-Series A, and Series A rounds, with follow-on capital for future growth. 

Originally founded by Jinesh Shah and Mark Kahn in 2010, Omnivore pioneered agritech investing in India, and over the past decade has backed over 35 start-ups which are making farming more profitable, resilient, sustainable, and climate-proof.  Omnivore is targeting a first close of the new fund by September 2022 and a final close by June 2023.  With this new fund, Omnivore expects to make 25 to 30 new investments over the next four years, continuing to fund entrepreneurs building the future of Indian agriculture and food systems. 

Omnivore Fund 3 will have a sharper focus on catalysing climate action in agriculture, backing start-ups addressing both climate mitigation (reducing India’s GHG emissions) and climate adaptation/resilience (securing a future for India’s farmers).  Along these lines, earlier this year, Omnivore launched the OmniX Bio initiative to provide additional support to agrifood life science startups, initially targeting the fields of agricultural biotechnology, novel farming systems, bioenergy and biomaterials, as well as innovative foods, including alternative protein.  With the new fund, Omnivore aims to deepen the reach and impact of OmniX Bio, and help reboot the agrifood life sciences ecosystem in India.

Mark Kahn, Managing Partner of Omnivore, stated, “For over a decade now, we have been a part of the evolution of the agritech ecosystem in India. Through Omnivore’s investments, we have touched the lives of almost 7 million smallholder farmers, improving their profitability and resilience, while creating value for our investors.  We believe agritech is just getting started, and we look forward to supporting a new generation of entrepreneurs building a future for rural India.”

The new fund will continue to invest

Agrotech, Allied Industry

Both companies have partnered to create sustainable change through unique drip irrigation technology

PepsiCo India and N-Drip, manufacturer of an innovative gravity-powered micro-irrigation system, have announced a partnership, as a lead-up to World Water Day 2022, to help farmers in India adopt game-changing technology in water efficiency. The technology has already been introduced in the states of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, and Rajasthan with an aim to improve water efficiency levels across thousands of hectares in the country by 2025. This is part of a global partnership between PepsiCo and N-Drip aimed at increasing water efficiency across 10,000 hectares (25,000 acres) around the world by 2025.

N-Drip’s high-efficiency irrigation system is powered by gravity and harnesses the water-saving benefits of high-pressure drip irrigation, but with low energy, operating and maintenance demands—making it more accessible to all types of farmers and nearly all types of crops. Farmers using N-Drip routinely achieve significant water savings, see larger crop yields, and reduce the need for expensive fertilizess. In addition, by converting from flood irrigation to N-Drip’s drip irrigation system, carbon (CO2) emissions are reduced by as much as 83 per cent and methane emissions by as much as 78 per cent.

Speaking about this development, Pratap Bose, Agro Director, Supply Chain, PepsiCo India, said, “Being an agri centric company at heart, PepsiCo India over the last 30+ years has been working towards increasing efficiency across its agri supply chain to reduce water usage by providing alternates to flood irrigation practices. The collaboration with N-Drip is another step in that direction. We are excited to partner with them as they are committed to solving the problem of water shortage by providing a robust alternative to flood irrigation. The initial response to the pilot project has been quite encouraging. We are already seeing improved crop yields, reduced fertiliser usage, and an average reduction of 39 per cent water consumption compared to flood irrigation in states of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, and Rajasthan.”

This new innovative technology not only applies to potato cultivation but also to other crops such as vegetables or maize.

Both companies have partnered to create sustainable

Agrotech, R&D

Mitsui will work with the management team and staff of the merged company to strengthen its management foundation

Tokyo based Mitsui & Co, has recently merged two European crop protection distribution business: Certis Europe B V, and Belchim Crop Protection NV/SA, both affiliates of Mitsui’s wholly owned subsidiary, Mitsui AgriScience International SA/NV.

The two companies will merge their operations to form a business with significant presence primarily in the European market. Upon completion of the required formalities, the new company’s name will be changed to Certis Belchim B V in order to capitalise on the brands of both companies.

Both companies have achieved growth as crop protection distribution platforms for the European and North American markets by working with the Mitsui & Co group through strategic alliances with leading Japanese R&D-focused crop protection manufacturers.

Mitsui will work with the management team and staff of the merged company to strengthen its management foundation, achieve the improvement of crop productivity and quality while pursuing environmental protection in agriculture by combining original high added-value products developed by Japanese R&D focused crop protection manufacturers and environment-friendly bio-pesticides and seed treatment preparations, which are strengths of both companies, to create an attractive crop protection distribution platform that will generate new value.

Mitsui will work with the management team

Agrotech

The programme defines clear milestones to cover all phases of the rice growing cycle from pre-sowing to harvesting

Corteva Agriscience, the global agriculture company, has recently introduced ‘Udayan – Tarakki ka Naya Savera’- an integrated farmer engagement programme is focused to establish and nurture a relationship with Corteva’s customers and channel partners. Aimed at empowering the farmers and bringing prosperity to them, the programme focuses on 3As – Aware, Alert, Act, as an enabler of change. The programme defines clear milestones to cover all phases of the rice growing cycle from pre-sowing to harvesting. It further aims to create awareness and sensitise rice farmers on brown plant hoppers (BPH) menace, timely and effective usage of Pexalon, a science-based and sustainable solution to manage the BPH menace, thus increasing yield productivity by 10 per cent.

With the help of ‘Farmer Connect App’, farmers can scan unique QR codes printed on Corteva products to distinguish between a ‘genuine Pexalon product’ against counterfeit, engage with fellow rice farmers and encourage others to use Pexalon.

In a span of 4 months since the launch of Udayan programme, Corteva brought more than 10 lakh acre farmland under various crop protection and care. More than 1.13 lakh farmers stayed connected through the app, and thousands of field photos were shared. Lakhs of farmers interacted on social media and learnt to use better crop protection products.

This programme was amplified by building a robust campaign ecosystem connecting all on-ground activities with digital programme via the Farmer Connect app. Commenting on the program, Gurpreet Bhathal, Marketing Director, Corteva Agriscience South Asia said, “Corteva is committed to working towards developing technology-driven solutions to meet farmers’ needs today while anticipating tomorrow’s challenges. We aim to provide products and services to help farmers produce what our food system demands while conserving resources and sustaining the land. In line with this commitment, our ‘Udayan’ programme focuses on educating the farmer community to use sustainable crop protection products that empower growers, protect their crop with precision.”

The programme defines clear milestones to cover