We design innovative prototypes for agriculture, custom agricultural machinery, and IoT systems for smart irrigation. We create predictive models to optimize agricultural production and develop high-impact Agrotech technologies tailored to the needs of the sector.
Agrotech prototypes are innovative solutions designed to address common problems in crops. Agricultural prototypes aim to test technological solutions that result in:
The need to create prototypes for agriculture is imminent. The increase and concentration of the population in large urban areas, as well as society's disincentive to engage in agriculture-related activities, have placed the responsibility on this industry to improve procedures and maximize the efficiency of agricultural processes, from the field to logistics. To achieve this, it is necessary to create prototypes and inventions to improve agriculture and its performance.
The Startups Agrotech son organizaciones jóvenes que nacen para crear soluciones tecnológicas aplicables al sector de la agricultura. Normalmente sus soluciones están relacionadas con aplicaciones digitales y análisis de datos. La gran ventaja de las startups Agrotech, es la adición de la visión más tecnológica a procedimientos que son claramente mejorables. En cambio, la desconexión o el desconocimiento de la agricultura, suele ser el principal riesgo de trabajar con empresas de Agrotech. Otro argumento a tener en cuenta, es que las empresas de Agrotech suelen tener sus propias soluciones o productos tecnológicos, el desconocimiento de la industria en ocasiones hace que las empresas Agrotech y sus soluciones innovadoras para la agricultura, no lleguen al éxito.
The best manufacturers of agricultural machinery and agriculture tools often have decades of history. The leading agricultural machinery manufacturers focus on optimizing their own agricultural machines as well as on their international commercialization. Creating innovative prototypes for agriculture with the best agricultural machinery manufacturers has both benefits and some associated risks. The positive aspect of agricultural machinery manufacturers is their experience and deep knowledge of the main limitations and key factors to consider when designing an agricultural machine with a high chance of success. However, the risk of creating agricultural machinery prototypes or other innovative agricultural products with long-established agricultural machinery manufacturers is that they are often not up to date with the latest technologies and find it more difficult to “think outside the box,” meaning to seek radical innovation solutions applicable to the agriculture industry. This can be summed up as a resistance to radical innovation.
The open innovation companies or innovative invention manufacturing companies focus their efforts on integrating various disciplines and engineering fields in a single environment, working together with maximum coordination to create agricultural machines, agriculture prototypes, or prototypes for any industry with a high level of innovation. Creating prototypes for agriculture with open innovation companies also has advantages and disadvantages. The main drawback of creating prototypes for agriculture with open innovation companies or prototype labs is their lack of knowledge about the specific details of agricultural processes. The main advantages of working with these invention and patent factories are their broad vision of viable innovation across many sectors, which can be applied to agriculture prototypes. In addition, they usually have experience in creating innovative products, which can be highly valuable for refining ideas for new agricultural inventions. For the best experience when working with these invention factories, it is essential that the engineering and product development team collaborates closely with the team of agriculture experts.
Agricultural Knowledge | Invention Focus | Innovation Capacity | |
Startups Agrotech | Middle | Low | High |
Agricultural Machinery Manufacturers | High | Low | Middle |
Invention and Patent Laboratories | Low | High | High |
Pesticide Innovation Prototypes: There are six motivations to focus on innovating agricultural prototypes that minimize or allow for the replacement of pesticide use. Consumer health protection, environmental protection, pest resistance, soil quality, process economy, and food security are the main elements affected or benefited by innovation related to pesticide use.
Precision Agriculture Prototypes: Precision agriculture involves the optimization of resources, time, and effort needed to tend to a crop across its entire extent. The principle of precision agriculture is the knowledge of precise data for specific areas. Precision agriculture prototypes allow for interpreting and detecting the needs of each area, identifying them, and assigning perfectly dosed specific resources to those areas. Innovative precision agriculture products optimize necessary economic resources and maximize crop profitability.
Blockchain Agricultural Prototypes: When we talk about blockchain, we think of Bitcoin and other virtual currencies. The truth is that blockchain is a horizontal technology, useful in many industries, especially when it is necessary to decentralize the possibility of auditing, ensuring that audited data is not corrupt. Blockchain prototypes for agriculture enable efficient traceability analysis, practically from the field to the consumer's table.
Vertical Agriculture Prototypes: The growing need for agricultural products due to the concentration of society in major cities makes it essential to optimize the space used for urban agriculture. This motivation has been key in the development of technologies and prototypes to improve vertical farming techniques. Within vertical agriculture, two types of agricultural prototypes stand out: Hydroponics and Aeroponics, whose definitions are included later.
AI Agricultural Prototypes: Applying artificial intelligence to agricultural prototypes can yield clear benefits, as long as the prototypes have the capacity to learn and predict. In most cases or examples of AI agricultural prototypes where we have had the opportunity to participate, the goal was:
All these examples of agricultural prototypes highlight the impact of AI on the development of prototypes useful for the development of precision agriculture.
Robotics Agricultural Prototypes: The development of prototypes with electromechanical solutions and robotics has allowed for the optimization of complex and labor-intensive processes with agricultural prototypes that substantially reduce the time, effort, and costs associated with such agricultural procedures. Robotics prototypes for agriculture make a lot of sense in repetitive tasks, such as harvesting and cleaning procedures of cultivated areas.
Clean Energy Agricultural Prototypes: The optimization of renewable energies, also known as clean energy, is mainly limited by exposure times to natural conditions. Therefore, what poses a limitation in large cities makes perfect sense in energy supply systems for useful agricultural prototypes. At Let’s Prototype, we use this type of energy supply system to power agro-climatic stations and other agricultural prototypes that require electronic elements at different points in the plantations.
It is essential to develop a research method that allows, through observation, the quantification of the economic impact of the problem. Many times, inventors create solutions for problems that are not as serious, and this is one of the main causes of prototype failure.
It is essential to understand the innovation trends in agriculture, the latest prototypes in testing phases, and to identify solutions that represent direct or substitute competition for the problem you aim to solve.
The analysis of agricultural prototypes can be carried out in two ways. The first is through the patent analysis of agricultural products. For example, if you want to patent in Spain, you can access the OEPM records and find similar solutions using practical methods to conduct a prior art search. In the case of patent registration in the United States, it is even easier to locate patents of similar products to an invention. The USPTO system allows filtering by industry, dates, and the state from where the patent is being filed in the USA. Using these filters, it is essential to understand the inventions that have been patented to solve similar problems. This is especially important because inventors often feel confident innovating new inventions just because they have not found them as commercial products in the market. However, this does not mean they can be patented, since even if a product is not available for purchase, other inventors may have already patented a similar system earlier.
The agricultural engineering projects allow demonstrating the technical feasibility of inventions at a laboratory level. This R&D cycle helps reduce future risks associated with creating inventions that do not yet exist. Before starting any prototype manufacturing process for agriculture, it is essential to prove its technical feasibility and create a kind of prototype manufacturing manual before moving into each stage. Even if substantial changes later arise in the agriculture prototype, the reality is that the prototype development cycle will be much cheaper if it has already undergone enough time and analysis to ensure its technical feasibility.
The agricultural prototypes are experimental products that make it possible to learn about the invention manufacturing process. The functional prototype development cycle, in addition to practically validating the technical feasibility of the invention, is a fundamental tool to raise funding for the development of an innovative product. Skipping the functional prototype manufacturing stage represents a very high risk, as it is very likely that the product cannot be mass-produced without first going through an experimental manufacturing process that allows for changes and improvements to be made easily and cost-effectively.
The agricultural prototypes face certain challenges when being tested in the field. Issues with data transmission coverage, as well as limited access to testing environments that simulate or resemble the scenarios where the prototype will ultimately be used, are some of the main barriers inventors must overcome.
After carrying out functional tests that demonstrate the agriculture prototype is technically feasible and capable of solving real problems found in the field, another equally important challenge arises: proving its economic viability. In this regard, conducting commercial experiments is the best solution, even before starting any series manufacturing cycle.
Vertical farming systems are those in which crops are grown at different heights, allowing for better use of space and improved control over crop conditions. The closest analogy to understand what vertical farming is would be the comparison between single-family homes and apartment buildings.
The hydroponics system is a sustainable vertical farming method, consisting of a column or similar structure capable of holding plants in support compartments. These compartments or support rings allow the roots to remain exposed in an environment where the necessary nutrients flow for the controlled growth of the plants.
Aquaponics is a vertical farming system very similar to Hydroponics. The main difference between these vertical farming systems is that in hydroponics, nutrients are added based on the control of parameters or nutrients in the water tank. In the case of Aquaponics, the nutrient balance depends on the waste produced by the fish that coexist within the innovative vertical farming system.
The aeroponics system, unlike the more well-known and popular vertical farming systems such as Aquaponics and Hydroponics, is based on a sealed structure equipped with sufficient electronic components to continuously measure nutrient levels, light spectra, and other critical parameters for plant growth. In aeroponics systems, plants grow on trays without soil, fully exposed, receiving from the environment the necessary nutrients for their growth. There are clear combinations of artificial intelligence, application development, and mathematical models within aeroponics systems, as it is very practical to maintain control by zones, types of crops, updated plantation status, and nutrient loads or light spectrum adjustments remotely.
Hydroponics | Aquaponics | Aeroponics | |
Nutrient acquisition | Dissolved in water. | Aqueous solution derived from fish waste. | Nutrients dispensed in the form of mist. |
Nutrient control | Continuous nutrient monitoring in the tank | Continuous control of the balance between fish and plants. | Nutrient control in the hermetic space of the cabinet. |
Sustainability | Media. Requires addition of non-natural clients. | High. Relies on a natural biological cycle. No external artificial nutrients are added. | Medium. Requires addition of non-natural nutrients. |
Advantages | Accurate control of plant growth | Precise control of plant growth and fish evolution. | Accurate control of plant growth |
Development costs | Middle | Middle | High |
Technical complexity | Middle | Middle | High |
Glucose indicators in plants make it possible to diagnose their ability to absorb light and essential nutrients. At Let´s Prototype, we have developed a device using widely available electronic components that allows for thorough monitoring of this parameter by using very inexpensive reusable strips. The goal of this innovative agriculture prototype has been to create an electronic device capable of reducing the cost of glucose monitoring systems in plants.
Based on the knowledge of agriculture experts and the client's experience, our invention factory has been able to manufacture a prototype unit for aeroponics, equipped with all the necessary electronic systems to efficiently disperse mist, control the durability of mechanical components, and facilitate the diagnosis and monitoring of parameters within the interior environment of the aeroponics-based agriculture system.
At our prototype design and manufacturing agency, we have built an agricultural machine prototype based on existing blowers, which, through a combustion energy system, allows farmers to collect nuts, olives, and other fruits using an ergonomic and safe agricultural machine that enables a much more efficient and ergonomic harvesting process.
Color variations in specific areas of the crop are often indicators of inefficiencies in the conventional farming system or presence of pests, lack of irrigation, among other causes that could put the crop at risk. Based on the client’s practical experience, we created a set of electronic devices strategically placed in the field. These electronic devices detect color variations that may be harmful to the crop, aiming to alert the farmer through a mobile application. This agriculture prototype is based on a combination of devices that include custom-made electronic components, telecommunication systems for agriculture, and other technologies that enable preventive crop control while reducing the farmer’s effort.
At Let’s Prototype, we have manufactured agricultural machines aimed at minimizing farmers’ risks in the field, as well as their effort in preventive control and the ergonomics of harvesting, crop cleaning, or planting processes. We have even manufactured prototypes of agricultural machines for domestic use, intended for urban micro-cropping systems or Microgreens.
The Agrotech companies, agricultural machinery manufacturers, and prototype design and manufacturing companies are the most common options to create an invention or prototype for agriculture. It is important to consider the experience and capability to integrate new existing agricultural technologies before making a decision.
The design of an agricultural prototype can cost between $15,000 and $20,000. The price of an agricultural invention depends on its technical complexity. The cost of designing and creating an invention should be separated from the cost of manufacturing the prototype, which is usually subject to a separate budget.
The design process of an agricultural prototype can take between 3 to 6 months. The creation period of an agricultural invention depends on the level of uncertainty of its functional principles and the state of the art or background of the invention. This includes whether the background is described in patents or in agricultural products available in the market.
The best source of inspiration for creating novel agricultural inventions is in the field itself. Often, engineers try to create agricultural products that end up solving problems inefficiently or addressing supposed inefficiencies that are not relevant to agricultural experts. To create an agricultural prototype, it is essential to have profiles that are in the field and know the procedures precisely.
The design process of an agricultural prototype can take between 3 and 6 months. The creation period of an agricultural invention depends on the level of uncertainty of its functional principles and the state of the art or prior art of the invention, whether described in patents or in agricultural products available on the market.
The best source of inspiration for creating innovative agricultural inventions is found in the field itself. Many times, engineers try to create agricultural products that end up solving problems inefficiently or addressing supposed inefficiencies that are not relevant to agriculture experts. To create an agricultural prototype, it is essential to have professionals who work directly in the field and have precise knowledge of the processes.
It is possible to patent inventions and prototypes created to improve agricultural processes. The fundamental requirements for a patent of an agricultural prototype are precisely to create a novel solution that demonstrates clear improvements in a known and necessary agricultural process. The cost of a patent for agriculture can range between $10,000 and $15,000. The price of these patents depends on the market and the number of agricultural inventions already patented in the country where the patent is filed.
The time to bring your ideas to life is now. We accompany you throughout the entire process: from idea to product.
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