Too rough
It cut the vine instead of the stem, and fruit fell off the truss on the way to the crate.
Back to square one
Growers liked it.Nobody needed it.
I pitched a glasshouse robot and walked out with polite yeses. Want, not need. So I stopped describing the robot and started over.
Where it's headingRead the deckRun your numbers
What went wrong
Every grower said yes to my robot.
It was politeness, not pain.
So I stopped pitching. Back to square one.
Now I ask one thing
What automation have you already been shown, and why didn't you buy it?
The refusals are where the money is. Each one marks something the machines on the market can't do — and somebody already burned a product cycle finding that out.
The refusals so far
Why growers didn't buy.
Each one is something today's machines can't do yet.
Too slow
It moved down the row slower than a person does.
Too narrow
It did a single job, then stood idle the rest of the year.
Too risky
They'd paid for machines that didn't deliver before. And when one stops mid-row, who fixes it?
Early notes. Not the answer yet.
Talk to me
Shown a machine you didn't buy? Tell me why.
I don't have the answer yet. The next weeks are calls, notes, and growers telling me what I got wrong.
krishaanth@getvinea.nl