This year's Seed Innovation Challenge Award was won by phenoLytcis, a company specialising in (literally) screening seeds to assess them for quality and other traits.
The winners of the Seed Innovation Challenge Award: phenoLytics
Presented annually by RWA Raiffeisen Ware Austria AG and Agro Innovation Lab, the award aims to highlight innovation in sustainable seed production, in any link of the chain.
The finalists
This year, 65 start-ups participated, from 24 different countries. From a selection of 12 finalists - Amphasys, Arable, ClimateAi, Cropin, Cropt, Green and Seed Corporation, Hiphen, Hudson River Biotechnology, Proofminder, VitalFluid, Zayndu and phenoLytics - the latter emerged as the winner.
Dutch touch
VitalFluids was the only Dutch nominee to make it to the finals. The company demonstrated the beneficial effects of treating seeds with Plasma Activated Water ('lightning water'). Plasma technology is used to disinfect water and bind nitrogen from the air. This results in clean water, which can translate into the use of less (chemical) crop protection agents, while at the same time bringing along a "free" extra fertiliser.
More info
The award ceremony took place last weekend at RWA's headquarters in Korneuburg, Austria. The winner can count himself lucky with international exposure in the first place and also wins 10,000 euros.
More information on the Seed Innovation Challenge Award can be found here.