Weenat, the European leader in soil moisture monitoring, has announced the acquisition of CoRHIZE, the irrigation management specialist.
Since their inception, Weenat and CoRHIZE have shared a common objective: to help farmers manage their irrigation so that they can save time and water. These two companies, which are rooted in their close links with the farming world, also share technological know-how that enables them to measure the water content of agricultural soils remotely and in real time using connected sensors. Their union is strengthened by the complementary nature of their approaches and technologies.
"Weenat's expertise in irrigation management and soil water content monitoring has been recognized for many years. This merger will enable us to combine our skills around the shared ambition of improving water efficiency in agriculture. For farmers, these are two solid, cutting-edge companies joining forces to provide them with a unique combined expertise in the market for irrigation management assistance and, more broadly, for understanding water in the soil, now and in the future," explains Serge Escuraing, founder of CoRHIZE.
Created in 2014 by Jérôme Le Roy, Weenat quickly established itself as a technology leader by launching, in 2015, the first wireless blood pressure meter, connected to a mobile app for farmers. Since then, the company has cultivated genuine expertise in the manufacture of reliable and accurate irrigation probes, while developing Decision Support Tools dedicated to irrigation management on its mobile app, as well as a broad spectrum of skills in engineering, machine learning, agronomy and meteorology.
"By placing innovation at the heart of its strategy, Weenat's mission is to help farmers meet the challenges of water management. The acquisition of Weather Measures in 2021 and the launch of the Meteoria European innovation project are the best examples of this. This merger with CoRHIZE marks an unprecedented opportunity to continue accelerating our ambition to improve water resource efficiency for the agricultural world. We are delighted to welcome the CoRHIZE teams to the Weenat Group," explains Jérôme Le Roy, chairman and founder of Weenat.
In terms of innovation, the data collected by the CoRHIZE connected probes will be used to enrich the database on which the learning algorithms of Weenat's data science teams are based. Since the end of 2023, Weenat's R&I teams have been working on a major project (Meteoria) aimed at using the data collected by soil sensors, satellite images and thousands of soil samples and analyses to assess the water content of all agricultural plots in Europe, even without sensors.
"CoRHIZE's expertise in measuring soil water content and translating this information into concrete actions to manage irrigation are major assets for the project," emphasises Jérôme Le Roy.
The new group now represents :
- more than 30,000 farmers using their solutions;
- more than 30,000 sensors installed in France and Europe;
- An agricultural-meteorological partnership with more than 300 distributors, including the network of Chambers of Agriculture France, major players in agricultural distribution,
universities and institutes leading the way in agricultural innovation in Europe;
- a presence in 15 countries, with plans to step up its international expansion.
For more information:
www.corhize.com
www.weenat.com