The Sparter was developed in close collaboration with Cerescon; an automatic selective harvester for white asparagus. The Sparter must ensure that European consumers can continue to enjoy delicious and affordable fresh asparagus.
Cerescon is a rapidly developing, high-tech scale-up in Agrofood robotics. They develop and market a selective harvesting solution for white asparagus called “Sparter”. Their objective is to automate picking of white asparagus and ensure that European consumers can continue enjoying a delicious and affordable dish of locally produced fresh asparagus.
The challenge in 2018 was to contribute to a viable business case for the Sparter by re-design of the selective robot unit. This unit is an important part of the Sparter automatic selective harvesting machine for white asparagus.
The goals of this re-design were to:
1. Increase the performance by factor two to specification level.
2. Decrease the cost price of the robot significantly, at least 35%.
3. Improve and guarantee manufacturability and serviceability.
Cerescon gave us the opportunity to start from “white paper” with our V2 model and execute on the technical functionality and industrialization specifications simultaneously, which led to a shorter time to “viable business case”. By using our V2 model, we achieved a higher performance in combination with a significantly lower price level of the robot unit.
At MTA we work using the V² model, in which product development and production run synchronously. Cerescon gave us the opportunity to start from ‘white paper’. We carried out the technical functionality and industrialization specifications at the same time. This has resulted in a viable business case in a short period of time.
Thanks to the working method of the V² model, we achieved a higher performance in combination with a significantly lower price level for the robot unit.
Dankzij de werkwijze van het V²-model bereikten we een hogere prestatie in combinatie met een beduidend lager prijsniveau van de robotunit.
Our approach resulted in a price reduction of 40 percent combined with a performance improvement (the number of asparagus harvested per hour) of 100 percent.
We have integrated our unit philosophy to ensure the manufacturability, testability and usability of the complete robotic unit. With this we ensure impeccable quality.
