Crop Controller helps growers worldwide with autonomous cultivation
Article HortiCoop Magazine BLAD – edition 1 – January 2025
The increasing shortage of experienced growers is forcing greenhouse horticulture to consider alternatives so it can keep growing. One of the solutions is the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Specialist, Blue Radix is offering an advanced system for this: Crop Controller. A joint investment from Horticoop and investment fund Navus Ventures will enable the autonomous cultivation pioneer to have global impact with its Al greenhouse applications. CEO Ronald Hoek: ‘More and more growers are starting to understand the power of and need for Al.’
Blue Radix is a market leader in autonomous cultivation. Crop Controller, developed by Blue Radix, is currently controlling some 100 greenhouses in sixteen countries. This Al solution enables growers to optimise their cultivation strategy, after which the entire process is autonomous.
Ronald: ‘Crop Controller’s climate and irrigation control enables us to take over eighty per cent of the climate computer work that growers usually do manually. In Crop Controller, Al handles all the difficult adjustments and ensures that implementing the chosen strategy is no longer a labour-intensive process that requires the knowledge of experienced growers. You enter your desired cultivation goals into Crop Controller and this implements all your climate and irrigation requirements every five minutes, 24/7. With our system, many of the considerations that growers usually make in their heads are weighed and assessed by Al.’
Whereas Crop Controller initially only handled the implementation of strategy, strategy optimisation was recently also integrated in the system. This feature makes life much easier for growers and enables more growth. Growers can now also produce the annual cultivation plan with Crop Controller, adjust this periodically if necessary and calculate whether the crop is on track to achieve the desired end goal.
Time and energy savings
Crop Controller doesn’t only result in an improved work-life balance for growers, it also results in a 7% increase in production, energy savings of 15% and a 10% reduction in water and fertiliser use! ‘The proven added value of Crop Controller is now so high that its further scale-up is something we want and can achieve’, explained Ronald. ‘The financial boost we received from Horticoop and Navus Ventures has helped us to accelerate our commercial growth, which also means we can expand our sales and marketing departments. And that’s vital because growers across the world would benefit from our product!’
The beginning of Crop Controller
Although artificial intelligence is currently really taking off and is on many people’s radar, this wasn’t yet the case some seven years ago. Ronald explains: ‘At that time, most people still worked using Excel and data wasn’t so important. However, that wasn’t the case for me! At that time I was working at AgroEnergy with various current Blue Radix colleagues, where we developed algorithms for daily energy management. The wealth of opportunities and just how essential it is to use new technology to control greenhouse processes was already clear to us then. When we talked with greenhouse horticulture company growers and owners, we noticed that they were becoming concerned about the scarcity of good growers.’ Ronald and his colleagues decided to focus on the entire cultivation process with Al, established Blue Radix together and developed Crop Controller.
‘The proven added value of Crop Controller is high. We can and want to scale up further now.’
The need for Al
You can’t avoid data, algorithms and artificial intelligence these days, which means there’s a big market for Crop Controller. Ronald: ‘Today The Blue Radix team we see the convergence of two aspects. First, growers and the greenhouse industry as a whole increasingly understand the power of Al and data-driven solutions. Our system was also developed over the years so that it can control, optimise and add value to all those greenhouses across the world. We’re currently a global leader in autonomous control of greenhouse processes. For 2025, we’re focusing on achieving growth in specific regions, although there’s also a lot of potential for growth in the Netherlands. Our country is really lagging behind in adapting to these kinds of autonomous control processes. And that’s a shame, because Dutch growers are really good, but they could be even better if they had the tools to obtain those extra kilos from the greenhouse. Al helps them fine-tune all of this.’
Progressing together
Blue Radix cannot and doesn’t want to accelerate its commercial growth alone. Ronald explains: ‘We’re working in close cooperation with other companies in the greenhouse, such as suppliers of climate computers, mat scales and irrigation sensors for vegetable cultivation. It’s extremely important for us that we cooperate not only with partners but also with growers. And particularly with Dutch growers so we also can further roll out autonomous cultivation in the Netherlands. We offer a solution to solve the structural problems of grower scarcity, but we can’t do it alone. We really need horticulturists because cooperation is essential!’
