CropX has been one of the world’s most advanced adaptive irrigation services. Now they have announced that service will be going even further with new investment partners. The global leaders in sensor manufacturing, Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH (RBVC) and Flextechnology accelerator, Lab IX have signed on to accelerate product development and rapidly expand market adoption. CropX has also unveiled a new soil sensor that cuts instillation time dramatically.
“The CropX adaptive irrigation platform has become a core component of our business model and has had an enormous impact on our bottom line – in water and fertilizer cost savings, as well as in crop yield improvement. The ability to cost-effectively automate the entire irrigation process, from data collection to actual irrigation, is a game changer as leaders in the agriculture industry look to increase sustainability, productivity and crop yield,” noted Jon-Michael J. Nahon, managing principal and head of market operations for Integrated Ag Financial.
CropX’s proprietary science helps farmers better understand water usage across their fields. Its low-cost soil sensors can increase crop yields while simultaneously cutting water usage by one third. In just one irrigation season, CropX sensors were installed on thousands of acres of all major row crops and demonstrated immense value, with early customers across the United States reporting dramatic water, manpower and cost savings, as well as massive crop yield gains. During the current growing season, CropX technology will be rolled out across hundreds of thousands of acres.
RBVC came on board because of the DIY capacity of the soil sensor technology, scalable IoT platform, powerful analytics and low-barrier SaaS business model.
Jan Westerhues, Investment Partner at Robert Bosch Venture Capital, added, “CropX gives farmers a fast and simple way to know the exact water needs and best irrigation plan of different parts of each field. Its pay-as-you-go service model makes it easy for farmers to quickly test the platform, realize its value and scale across more fields, crops and farms.”
The newest generation of sensors can be installed in an impressive four minutes. That’s sixteen minutes off the previous record, also held by CropX. Sensors start at $380 a piece with an annual subscription starting at $220/sensor.
“Our vision goes far beyond row crops. We want to make adaptive irrigation a global endeavor, and you can only do that by moving the lab into the soil and the resulting data into the cloud,” noted CropX CEO Isaac Bentwich. “More efficient water usage should start on the farm, but there is no reason for it to end there. We need to make better use of our water supply across the board – from millions of acres of commercial row crops and thousands of orchards and organic farms, to golf courses and the smart homes of the future. Adaptive irrigation has the potential to save billions of gallons of water each year while driving better outcomes for farmers, business and consumers alike.”