Kearney-Janssens said Horsch’s founder Michael Horsch was looking to enter the Ontario market and was in talks with a competitor before Kearney entered its name into the ring.
“Michael Horsch himself spent a week with us and visited farming operations to get a real feel of farming practices and the various types of soil farmers are working with,” Kearney-Janssens said. “He’s a farmer first and tries out his products on his farm before offering them commercially.”
The deal took about six months to complete, but has some asking why Kearney would take on an additional line of planters when the company’s Kinze line is performing successfully.
“The Horsch Maestro planter is currently best suited for larger farms seeking added capacity to carry more bulk seed and bulk dry fertilizer in a very tidy and smartly designed machine,” said Jay Curtis, who was responsible for bringing the idea of Horsch to Kearney.
Kearney-Jannsens said developing a partnership with Horsch is a way to stay ahead of the technological landscape in agriculture.
“There are so many technology changes in farming right now. Who doesn’t want to be a part of that?”
Curtis provided an example of such technology.
“Horsch engineers in Europe had mastered a system using a gyroscope combined with a processor and other systems to allow a sprayer boom to be operated extremely low to the target and allow very high travel speeds. It will save (farmers) a large amount of money and will increase productivity. Science at its finest.”