About

Vivid Machines, a Canadian agri-tech company aims to revolutionize the fruit industry by addressing labor shortages, reducing food loss, and improving profitability. Currently, 30% of fruit produced fails to reach grocery stores due to quality issues. Traditional barriers like leaf canopies have hindered large-scale data collection, but Vivid Machines has overcome this with the development of its proprietary sensor and intelligence system. The Vivid X-Vision system, equipped with a spectral sensor and computer vision technology, integrates seamlessly into farm workflows. The spectral sensor surpasses human vision, providing growers with detailed insights from bud to harvest. This includes critical data on fruit loads and size distribution and eventually will provide early detection of pests and diseases.

Project

One of the main technical challenges fruit growers face is crop load management. Ontario growers use both chemical sprays and hand thinning to manage how much fruit stays on their trees. Successful thinning promotes better fruit growth and improves the bloom for the following year. Thinning is typically timed around the “June Drop,” when some fruit naturally falls off, but achieving precision is difficult due to the risk of overthinning. Improper application of thinners can lead to either excessive or insufficient thinning, requiring additional labor to correct, which significantly increases overall orchard management costs.

With support from CIT’s Sector Adoption Program, Vivid is integrating crop analytics into variable rate sprayers and equipment. Offering real-time orchard results enables data-driven decisions that optimize labor during pruning, thinning, and harvesting. This increases yield, sustainability, and the volume of saleable fruit. Vivid is partnering with Provide Agro, an Ontario-based company specializing in horticulture equipment and technological solutions. The partnership will enable Vivid to accelerate rollout and commercialization of its proprietary technology across Ontario and Canada.

Impact & Outcomes

The anticipated economic benefits for Vivid, Provide Agro and apple growers across Ontario are substantial. With successful integration of crop analytics into variable rate sprayers, Vivid anticipates increasing its Ontario revenue by $1.2 million over the next 3-5 years. Expanding Vivid’s commercial channels to new growers will require hiring at least 5 high-skilled field technicians and machine learning engineers. Provide Agro, also projects an increased profit of $400,000 over the same time frame.