Join us at Foresight for a virtual road trip across Canada in our annual series Cleantech Coast to Coast. From the nation’s largest urban centres, to remote pockets of innovation, we’ll celebrate Canada’s inspiring innovators at every stop.
Buckle up, and come along with us as we visit some of the change-makers and cleantech leaders who are deploying impactful climate solutions, and moving the needle toward net zero. Our next stop: Fredericton, NB.
Have you ever wondered how farmers are able to accurately keep track of the health of their huge agricultural crops? The answer used to be through a very slow, inefficient process that involved sending plant samples to a lab, and waiting days or sometimes even weeks to receive the results. New Brunswick’s Picketa Systems is changing the game with a plant tissue analysis technology that provides real-time results, removing nearly all turnaround time in the process of analyzing plant samples.
Picketa Systems’ user-friendly technology is called LENS — Leaf Evaluated Nutrient System. Within seconds, LENS scans the plant leaf, then processes the raw data through Picketa’s cloud platform before providing nutrient results to the user. Data across multiple seasons gets stored, allowing farmers to keep track of the techniques they are using and make optimal fertilizer choices to maintain the best yield going forward.
By equipping agribusinesses with LENS technology, users gain full control of their data collection. Users can collect data according to their own schedules, and remove all risks associated with sending samples to a lab, like shipping delays or lost materials. LENS benefits everyone in the chain, from growers to vendors all the way to researchers.
When asked about his motivations for starting the company, Picketa Systems’ CEO Xavier Hebert-Couturier has lived experience that lead him into the agtech space.
Above the general climate risk and fertilizer regulations, we grew up in communities affected by illnesses caused by an over-exposure to agri-chemicals, like cancer.
By providing real-time nutrient readings, LENS technology is helping eliminate the need for an overuse of chemicals in agricultural settings ‘just to be safe’.
As members of the 2023 Earth Tech accelerator cohort, Hebert-Couturier and the rest of the team at Picketa Systems are working to expand their LENS monitoring systems beyond just potato crops.
Earth Tech is a six-month accelerator delivered in partnership between SI Canada and Foresight Canada that supports the commercialization of companies led by committed teams driven by environmental impact. The program supports early-stage companies to validate their solutions and business models, advance their technologies, raise funding, and create meaningful impact.
Ready to accelerate your venture? Apply to Accelerate from Anywhere, or contact us to learn more.
