“Today we have these electric drive meter upgrades where we can take an existing planter, say back to 2015 – a MaxEmerge 5 planter – and we can add these meter upgrades without having to replace that entire row unit,” said Taryn Fischels, precision upgrades product marketing manager for John Deere.

The move allows growers to increase their efficiency and accuracy when it comes time to put seed in the ground, and keep costs down if their current John Deere planter still has a few years left on it.

Fischels said that John Deere will start taking orders in June 2025 and kits will be ready for the 2026 planting season.

PowerStar gets revamped with four new models

At the show and getting plenty of attention from visitors at the New Holland booth was the latest PowerStar tractor. The new PowerStar comes in four models: 90, 100, 110 and 120 and range from 87 to 117 horsepower. Engine power is driven down to the wheels with New Holland’s FPT Industrial 3.6-liter four-cylinder engine on all four models.

“The PowerStar line has been with New Holland for decades. It’s really become synonymous with power, utility and comfort,” said Mike Sevick, business manager for New Holland North America. “What we’re really launching here is the next generation of those features and those benefits for customers with this tractor line.”

Want to learn more? Watch for full video interviews on John Deere’s planter upgrades and New Holland’s latest PowerStar tractor coming soon to AgDealerTV.

Organized by Kentucky Venues and recognized around the world as a premier farm trade show event, the National Farm Machinery Show welcomes as many as 300,000 visitors from across the U.S. and many other countries each year.

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To help develop and bring that product to market, the Ruuds entered into a joint agreement between their startup firm, Nature’s Net Wrap, and CNH Ventures, the investing arm of the equipment manufacturer CNH Industrial and parent company behind Case IH and New Holland.

The compostable twine is being sold by Case IH and New Holland dealers starting this spring.

Increasingly, major equipment brands are keeping an eye out for young startup companies like Nature’s Net Wrap that have an innovative technology on their boards. And, as in this case, they are pumping investment money into them to help develop and incorporate that technology into their own product line.

“We launched CNH Ventures a couple of years ago,” points out Michele Lombardi, senior vice-president of corporate development at CNH. “Our purpose is joining forces with innovative teams of people that are working on disruptive technologies or new ideas, primarily in the ag tech space.”

Since starting, CNH Ventures has invested in 10 fledgling firms and bought another one outright, Lombardi says, “It’s a strategic investment… we invest to learn. And then, obviously, we seek a good financial return as well.”

“Sometimes we do some hires,” adds Lombardi. “We find a little team that has a good technology, good IP (intellectual property) or a good way of working and we just scoop them up and they are fully integrated into our teams as if they were always part of it. In some cases that’s the right thing to do.”

Although CNH’s prime objective isn’t to take over control of these firms or hire the individuals that populate them, they did buy Augmenta for its electronic eye technology, and increased their ownership share to 51 per cent in another.

Now, a similar strategy is underway in a slightly different program over at John Deere, which also looks to partner with small startups to enhance its R&D. Deere calls their program the Startup Collaborator, and in January it announced its list of six tech firms it will work with through the course of 2024 on a one-year term.

Deere launched the Startup Collaborator program in 2019, with a new group each calendar year.

“We’re really focused on mutual learning across the aisle in the companies, with the focus of solving customer problems in the field,” says Cody Sorge, business development manager with the Intelligent Solutions Group at John Deere.

“It’s a very light agreement we have,” Sorge emphasizes. “There’s no investment or IP involved. We get to work with these companies for a 12-month period, starting (each) January.

“They get a sponsor — or mentor — from the Deere team and a project lead to work with them. Then they go work on a project that is mutually beneficial… and we share information.”

Testing the limits

Whether you’re looking to do business with CNH or Deere, however, you’ll find that neither firm thinks of tech startups as a replacement for internal R&D. Instead, it’s a complementary or additional avenue to increase the number of technologies beyond what their in-house engineers can take on, especially the kinds of technologies that have been the main focus of the smaller companies.

The goal is for the big company to get a head start in the evolution of a product.

“Recently, this arm (CNH Ventures) has helped us to accelerate exploration of new spaces and to test some assumptions,” says Lombardi. “Before, we probably couldn’t do it as effectively because we would probably have had to acquire a company to do it or go through an entire internal development.

“It’s not replacing anything, it’s adding an additional option.”

The same is true at John Deere.

“What (Deere’s) program was founded for was finding opportunities with startup companies where technologies are being developed,” says Sorge, who goes on to describe what they’re looking for: “Really agile, focused teams that can move really quickly solving customer problems, making this technology available. Deere’s a large tech company. We might not be as focused or be able to move as quickly, so there’s a perfect opportunity to learn together.”

Who wins the contract?

Deere and CNH also have similar decision processes for figuring out which startups to work with. The main focus is on small firms that are working in the tech sector and have or are attempting to develop systems that could be a benefit to the larger companies.

“It’s a mix of things (we look for),” says Lombardi. “We predetermine some spaces we are interested in. It might be vision AI, it might robotics, these kinds of things. Once we have that direction, we then go out and build a map of all the players in that space. That creates a dynamic list of all the investments we could make and collaborate. We then go out and speak to many of them. In some cases they might not be interested. In some cases it might be the right target at the right time.

“We tend to work with a wider range of companies, not just the ones we invest in. We might start dialogue with these companies, even if we don’t invest.

“We look at how their technology is different from that around them. Why does that technology have a greater opportunity to be successful. We think how does that technology fit with our road map specifically? Going down the line, is this something we would be interested in including in our products? We participate in learning with those companies through an investment. If some of them become so interesting we think we should incorporate them, then we end up acquiring them.”

The investments made through the CNH Ventures initiative create a portfolio of small startups that can generate a financial return. In the case of Nature’s Net Wrap, it also adds a product that can be sold through CNH dealerships, although Lombardi says exclusivity in selling the products isn’t necessarily a requirement. In fact, CNH encourages the startups to forge their own way rather than limiting them.

“That’s a never-ending discussion we have internally,” Lombardi says. “All our companies, except one, have or will have in the future products that can be sold through our network. We do not force them to sell through our network. It’s potentially limiting to the growth of the companies, forcing them to only work with you. What happens is they lose that entrepreneurship. We drive them to develop their own commercial capability in order to be able to explore the world on their own. Through which, by the way, we learn too.”

At Deere, when it comes to selecting partners to collaborate with, the decision process follows a kind of parallel trajectory.

“Back in 2019 we asked, how can we get really connected to startups? How can we get them connected to us and learn together to see what’s possible?” says Sorge. “We start internally by looking at what we want to go and learn and what opportunities our customers have to solve. Then we’ll explore what companies are out there.

“It all starts at customers, identifying those areas of interest and then plugging in the right companies that fit. We want to make sure there are truly mutual benefits (for startups and Deere).”

Picking winners means taking a close look at more than just the advanced technologies that the startups are pursuing. It can be a bit of a Goldilocks story, finding the startups that are just right.

“We want to make sure they’re at the right stage,” says Sorge. “Making sure they’re early enough, a startup, and not too far along, they’re at the right stage. We’re trying to benefit each other in a win-win scenario.”

The big questions

“We clearly look at the management team,” adds Lombardi. “Do they have that spark in their eyes? Will they be able to continue the development or are they exhausted by what they’ve brought to the table and that’s it?

“If we invest, are they going to be loyal? Will they stay with the company or fly away like a butterfly and do something else? All these thoughts then become important elements in the decision-making, Are we going to put in some capital and commit longer term with these guys?”

Deere doesn’t extend the one-year time frame startups can stay in the Collaborator program, but neither does it rule out maintaining a relationship with a small firm that has impressed it. An example of a company that started off in the Collaborator program and ended up in the Deere family is Bear Flag Robotics in California. It’s a company that had been specializing in developing an add-on full autonomy system for Deere tractors. That is now the technology behind Deere’s autonomous 8R tractor offering, which is in the early stages of commercialization.

“There’s been companies invested in and acquired, even though that’s not the intent of what we’re trying to do,” says Sorge. “It’s really around go explore, learn and identify what we can learn together. And after that, see what happens. We try not to put a clear end on what happens.”

At all large organizations there can be a lot of top-down corporate standardization in procedures and rules regarding how things should be done. Inserting small agile, entrepreneurial firms with their own, often fast and loose processes can be a disruptor when it comes to how R&D gets done.

“We have our legacy approach, and the startups are blasphemous,” says Lombardi with a smile. “They go in and do things upside down and completely different. It’s a horror reaction from our team every time they see it. But it actually gets them thinking and makes them more agile, I think.

“Our ventures initiative is giving to CNH, as a team, far more than any potential financial return. It has truly accelerated our innovation capability by exposing us to different ideas and different ways of innovating.”

Both Lombardi and Sorge believe the approach has paid off, and each has major plans to continue their respective programs.

“I think it’s a wild success,” says Sorge. “At the end of year, we’re always blown away. It’s hard to go and measure, but I think in gaining awareness to technology, startups getting awareness to more customer problems to solve, awareness to Deere and how we work… those are the main measurements of success.”

Says Lombardi, “We like it. We’re learning a lot. It’s been successful. We’ll keep on investing.”

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Day two of the NFMS saw Massey Ferguson debut its 500R sprayer to attendees, and New Holland was eager to show how its latest collaboration helps guide all of your harvested grains into a grain cart.

Heath Kehnemund, marketing product specialist with Massey Ferguson, says the company’s 500R sprayer is designed for ease of operation and requires less maintenance.

“One of the things that we do differently than a lot of our competitors on the market is we have a LiquidLogic system…” said Kehnemund, “at the end of the day if you get blown out or rained out we can actually bring that product back to the tank to be able to go out and spray the next day.”

To help keep problem areas to a minimum, greaseless bushings are standard on the 500R and the cab interior takes a common look-and-feel approach for operators.

“It’s a common cab across a lot of our platforms,” said Kehnemund, “A guy can go from one machine to another and be very comfortable.”

Automation ‘Raven’ swoops in

A second new announcement at the show for New Holland was its collaboration with Raven Industries for Raven Cart Automation.

The new automated system reduces operator error during the handoff of grain between a combine operator and a tractor operator during harvest.

“With the system set up, you have reduced chances of impact, reduced chances of grain spillage, reduced chances of operator error as a whole” said Nick Mortensen, technology marketing manager for New Holland.

Raven Cart Automation works via local radio frequency which provides no delay in connection between the combine and a tractor. The system also allows combine operators to call up to six grain carts at a time in order to keep things moving smoothly in the field.

Want to hear more? Watch for upcoming videos of the Massey Ferguson 500R sprayer and the New Holland Raven Cart Automation system coming soon to AgDealerTV.

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Two well-known machinery brands took this opportunity to pull back the curtain and showcase their latest offerings in the combine market.

After turning heads at the Agritechnica show in Germany last November, New Holland’s CR11 combine began its North American tour on opening day of the annual show in Louisville, Kentucky.

New Holland’s C11 combine sports a brand new Cursor 16 engine and sees a horsepower output of 775, an increase of 75 horsepower compared with its C10 brother.

“This combine is built on the strong legacy of New Holland twin-rotor combines,” said Curtis Hillen, combine marketing manager for New Holland. “But this sets a new benchmark in the industry in terms of combine performance.”

Not to be outdone – and also weighing in at 775 horsepower – was Case IH’s new AF11 combine parked on the other side of the Exposition Center hall.

Leo Bose, harvest marketing manager with Case IH, says there are three areas the company has focused in on with its latest and largest combine.

“There’s really three areas that we focus in on,” said Bose. “Not only capacity, but the technology and the run time that really our customers are requesting for the size of machine we see behind us today.”

Want to learn more? Watch for upcoming videos of both of these combines on AgDealerTV coming soon to a screen near you.

Now in its 58th year, the National Farm Machinery Show is the largest indoor trade show in the United States.

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At a National Farm Machinery Show pre-show media event in Louisville, Kentucky, on Feb. 13, New Holland product reps were on hand to show what the blue brand has in store for growers and show-goers alike.

Sean Dorosz, global product manager for New Holland T8 and T9 tractors, says the company’s fully upgraded four-tracked T9s have seen improvements in several areas.

“The track modules themselves have now got the proper axle so we can go the ground speed of 25 miles an hour (40.23 kms) instead of 19,” Dorosz said. “So we’ve picked up our ground speed just over 35 per cent.

Horsepower on the T9s have also been given a boost.

“The rated horsepower of the machines have gone up. So you can pull the bigger implements and get them up the hill faster and get more acres done per hour,” Dorosz said. “This is still a 13-litre engine, we’ve just been able to turn up the engine horsepower.”

Dorosz added that this increased the top model from 620 rated horsepower to 645.

Fuel capacity on the T9s has ballooned by 45 per cent by finding a proper fit for saddle tanks, allowing operators to refuel less often, said Dorosz.

“The saddle tanks came from the wheeled tractors. We’ve now been able to fit them onto the tracked machine,” Dorosz adds. “The prior track unit, the tracks got in the way. They were a different design and interfered.”

To make getting into the cab easier, the entry ladder pivots and can be moved when the tractor is steered to the left. The number of work lights and lumen strength on the T9s have also increased, making for a 30 per cent increase overall on the front and rear of the tractor.

Dorosz said that full production of the New Holland T9 tractors will kick off in the fourth quarter of 2024.

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The Italian-American group, whose shares are currently traded both on the NYSE and in Milan, earlier this year announced a plan to abandon its Italian listing.

CNH said in a statement on Tuesday that the Milan Stock Exchange had approved an application it filed to delist its ordinary shares from Milan bourse and had set the Jan. 2 date for when a NYSE single listing will be effective.

Its shares will be tradable in Milan until Dec. 29.

CNH also on Tuesday lowered its 2023 revenue forecast, citing a softening for its farm machinery, predominantly in South America, sending its shares plummeting.

As part of its New York single-listing plan, CNH announced a new share buyback program worth up to US$1 billion.

“The program is intended to optimize the capital structure of the company and to assist with offsetting any potential volatility arising from the delisting of its shares on Euronext Milan,” CNH said in a statement.

Since it spun off its truck and bus unit in January 2022, now separately listed as Iveco Group, the majority of CNH stock trading has progressively shifted to NYSE, the company said.

“Concentrating trading in one market should allow for increased liquidity and investor focus, while further simplifying the company profile and compliance requirements,” it said.

The new buyback program will run between Nov. 8 and March 1 and will be funded through the company’s liquidity.

It will consist of two components: the repurchase of shares worth up to 400 million euros (C$588 million) on Euronext Milan and on multilateral trading facilities between Nov. 8 and Dec. 29 and the repurchase of shares for the remaining amount to be executed on NYSE between Nov. 8 and Match 1.

Goldman Sachs is acting as financial advisor to CNH, while BNP Paribas is acting as co-advisor and buyback agent for the group in Europe.

— Reporting for Reuters by Giulio Piovaccari.

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CNH’s New Holland Agriculture arm said Monday its T4 Electric Power model, “the first all-electric utility tractor with autonomous features,” will be launched this week at the Farm Progress Show, and commercially available in North America with “select dealers” early in 2024.

The Decatur, Illinois farm show will also host the unveiling of the Farmall 75C Electric, a utility model that CNH’s Case IH arm billed in a separate release Monday as its “smartest” electric tractor.

New Holland said the T4 “opens a new class in the market, the Utility Electric,” and will be an “ideal solution for lower-horsepower field operations” such as mixed farms, hay and forage, dairy and other livestock and greenhouse, vegetable and orchard crops.

The T4 Electric Power battery system and fully electric drivetrain provide a 110-kilowatt-hour maximum energy storage capacity in a 400-volt circuit, for 74 horsepower (55 kilowatts) rated power and 65 hp (48 kW) PTO power, CNH said.

Given the usual light-, medium- and heavy-duty applications of a utility tractor, New Holland estimates the T4 can provide four hours’ average runtime, or up to eight working hours in strictly “low-energy demand” applications.

The T4 unit also includes four-wheel drive, a 12×12 transmission, clutch-less electronic power shuttle reverser and “all the regular power outputs of a traditional diesel utility,” CNH said, such as rear electro-hydraulic PTO, drawbar, multiple rear remotes, mid-mount valves and a New Holland 725LU mechanical self-leveling front loader with third function and 84-inch bucket.

The electrified drivetrain allows for high torque and fast response, which with the electronic power shuttle transmission, means “even an inexperienced operator can run the implements during the applications without the need for precise gear selection and throttle control,” CNH said. Experienced operators will have “infinite” speed adjustments by controlling motor rpm.

The T4 can be recharged in either alternate current (AC) or direct current (DC), and would take one hour to charge to 100 per cent power using a “commercially available” DC fast-charging system, CNH said.

The T4’s “Smart Roof” houses the cameras and sensors supporting its “driver-assisted” features such as Follow Me Mode, the Invisible Bucket and 360 Degree Awareness, along with “fully digital and connected” functions such as Over the Air Updates, Live View and Map Maker — all of which New Holland said will make this tractor “the first of its kind in the world.”

Case IH, meanwhile, said it will mark the Farmall brand’s “100th year” with a sneak peek at the Farmall 75C Electric at the Farm Progress Show.

The 75C’s exact specs weren’t available in Monday’s release, in which Case IH said the unit will be available for “limited orders” in the first quarter of 2024 and released “in specific markets” during the year.

Like the T4, the Farmall 75C offers “diesel-like performance with an average four-hour run time and fast recharging, plus lower operating costs,” Case IH said, allowing “maximum ” versatility” for jobs such as maintaining vineyards or managing a small herd. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Case IH and New Holland’s parent firm CNH and Honey Bee Manufacturing say they’ve set up a partnership agreement for compatibility between those two windrower lines and Honey Bee’s WSC Swather series draper heads.

The draper’s components and wide swathing widths, along with the “speed and precision” of the Speedrower Plus, make for “a fast and efficient harvesting solution,” New Holland and Honey Bee said Tuesday in a release.

The combination of a WSC30 Swather draper head with the Speedrower 260 Plus was first put on display at an Ag PhD Field Day event at Baltic, S.D. on July 25, while the Honey Bee draper heads for Case IH windrowers were launched the previous week at Ag in Motion at Langham, Sask.

“Operations that swath grains have been asking for a draper head solution to work with our Speedrower Plus series self-propelled windrowers and we listened,” Josh Harkenrider, commercial hay and forage product marketing manager for New Holland Agriculture in North America, said in Tuesday’s release.

“We’re confident this partnership will provide a robust solution for customers as it combines the experience from Honey Bee with the productivity, precision and performance of our windrowers.”

New Holland and Honey Bee said the combination will be available in two draper head models, the 30-foot WSC30 and the 36-foot WSC36. Both will include the SCH Easy Cut cutting system with spring steel guards including cutting edges on the top and bottom, plus alternating, bolted, heat-treated sections, which the companies said will “eliminate” the need for hold-downs.

“When you combine the wide cutting widths and the array of proven components, along with the hydraulic capacity, advanced SensiDrive drive-by-wire controls and easy-to-use precision solutions on our Speedrower Plus Series, customers can expect a faster and more efficient harvest for seasons to come,” Harkenrider said.

The WSC30 and WSC36 are also the models compatible with Case IH’s WD5 units. Case IH said the Honey Bee draper heads with adjustable castering gauge wheels will “eliminate gouging and crop scuffing.”

The Case IH/Honey Bee collaboration “unlocks the draper potential of the WD5 series windrowers for small grain and canola producers,” Brian Spencer, Case IH marketing manager for hay and forage products, said in a separate release last month.

“Every minute a machine sits idle cuts into producers’ bottom lines,” he said. “The Honey Bee draper heads include heavy-duty rollers for a longer service life. They can also quickly replace reel fingers with only pliers and a wrench to get the equipment back in the field faster.”

Case IH said the draper heads’ integrated transport function will also allow operators to save time moving from field to field with “quick and convenient field-to-road conversion.”

Jamie Pegg, general manager for Honey Bee, said in Tuesday’s release that the partnership agreement “puts our proven platform into the hands of more farmers through CNH Industrial’s robust dealer network.”

Honey Bee was founded in 1979 by brothers Greg and Glenn Honey and their wives at Bracken, Sask., about 155 km south of Swift Current. The company expanded into harvest headers in the 1980s and set up shop at nearby Frontier in 1987.

The company today operates on over 100,000 square feet of production and warehousing space, selling into both the domestic and export markets. Its other product lines include the AirFlex, Grain Belt and Rice Belt header systems and the Rod Master rod weeder. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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Not only can farmers kick the tires on a machine of interest — they can actually see how it performs compared to competitors. That definitely helps inspire confidence when making a buying decision.

This year the show again offered a look at the main choices farmers have in the equipment market. John Deere led off the demonstration with an 9R590 tractor paired with a P670 Precision Air Hoe Drill and C850 cart. Morris entered one of its Quantum air drills and 9-Series cart in the demonstration group.

A local Saskatchewan manufacturer, Pillar, brought a model of its double-shoot, single-pass disc hoe hybrid. Another Saskatchewan company, SeedMaster, was back again this year with a 6016-Ultra SR-750 that featured the UltraPro II metering system.

Vaderstad, a Sweden-based manufacturer that has taken over Saskatchewan-based manufacturer Seed Hawk, ran a Dakota 60 disc drill paired with a large capacity PD1000 air cart.

New Holland had its P2082 double shoot disc drill and P4950 cart. This is the first year the P2082 will include the brand’s Opt-Row automated downforce control.

Horsch demonstrated its single-row Avatar 60 MD low-disturbance single disc model.

— Scott Garvey is a machinery writer in Winnipeg.

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The company increased its revenue outlook for industrial activities to between eight and 11 per cent this year, versus a previous forecast of between six and 10 per cent.

Farmers’ solid income cushioned profits even as commodity prices came down from their peaks a year ago. Growers were able to cash in on still-elevated wheat and soybean prices, which fueled purchases for new and used machinery, CNH CEO Scott Wine said.

CNH’s farm equipment brands include Case IH, New Holland, Steyr and Flexi-Coil.

“The high-horsepower and cash crop markets continue to be very strong,” Wine said in an interview, adding that the company is planning to accelerate production of large ag equipment to catch up on volume output that was reduced during an eight-month long United Auto Workers strike.

Like competitors Deere and Caterpillar, CNH’s profit margins were propped up by price increases across its machinery businesses to offset inflated input costs and a choppy supply chain.

Analysts believe the manufacturer’s double-digit price hikes that contributed to a 16 per cent increase in net sales on the year for its agriculture division will sustain the company’s margin growth in the coming quarters, said Eric Greaser, vice-president at Moody’s.

Industrial activity revenues increased 21 per cent in 2022.

CNH’s first-quarter adjusted earnings before interest and tax (EBIT) for industrial activities rose 29 per cent to US$555 million, just ahead of analysts’ consensus forecast in a Reuters poll. Revenue was in line with expectations at US$4.78 billion.

Company executives said they were confident the company would complete its delisting from the Milan bourse by the end of the year and keep its shares trading only in New York.

— Reporting for Reuters by Giulio Piovaccari in Milan and Bianca Flowers in Chicago.

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