USA | Soil management

The Climate Corporation Announces Acquisition of Soil Analysis Business Line of Solum, Inc

Invests In Industry-Leading Precision Soil Analysis To Help Farmers Make More Informed Decisions.

2/20/2014

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The Climate Corporation announced today the acquisition of the soil analysis business line of Solum, Inc., an agriculture technology company. The acquisition of Solum’s industry-leading soil analysis service underscores The Climate Corporation’s commitment to using data science to help farmers identify ways they can continue to optimize crop yields and use resources more efficiently.

David Friedberg, CEO of The Climate Corporation, emphasized the importance of precision soil analysis in order to produce the most effective advisory services for farmers. “Each season, farmers face a wide range of soil-related decisions that can help them improve the productivity of the finite land they farm. High quality, consistent soil analysis will ensure farmers, agronomists and ag retailers can offer and access improved decision support resources to increase on-farm efficiency. Essentially, with more accurate and consistent data inputs, the insights and recommendations we provide for farmers can be more precisely customized to their fields, helping them make better decisions for their farms,” said Friedberg.

The asset acquisition by Monsanto Company, The Climate Corporation’s parent company, includes the Solum brand, soil testing intellectual property, the soil test lab in Ames, Iowa, and Solum’s No-Wait Nitrate™ platform. The Ames lab will continue to provide its highly accurate and reliable mail-in sample service to help customers measure and manage their soil fertility. The Climate Corporation will continue to operate Solum’s No-Wait Nitrate™ platform, which offers real-time measurement of soil nitrate levels from the edge of the field. The Climate Corporation has extended job offers to all Solum employees working in their soil testing business. Solum’s software business line will remain independent under its new brand, Granular, Inc.

“We’re pleased to become a part of The Climate Corporation team and see this as a tremendous opportunity to provide a new level of accurate soil information that will ultimately help stakeholders across agriculture use resources more efficiently,” said Nick Koshnick, co-founder of Solum, who will lead the continued development of the Solum technology as part of The Climate Corporation. “We look forward to continuing our work with agricultural retailers and agronomists and to building new working relationships with Monsanto’s channel partners to help them provide a complete soil testing solution that gives farmers the information they need to focus their input dollars where they will generate the highest yield and return,” Koshnick added.

Soil composition and fertility is the foundation of agricultural production, and understanding soil variability and nutrient profiles is essential to making effective precision agriculture decisions. Tailoring inputs to optimize soil productivity ultimately helps farmers improve their overall productivity and increase yields. “The technology The Climate Corporation is gaining in this acquisition, as well as the research and development we currently have underway, will continue to improve our ability to deliver better insights and recommendations to farmers,” said Friedberg.

Additional details of the agreement were not disclosed.