SAIA Agrobotics :: Greenhouse Tomato Cultivation Through a Fully Integrated, Plant-Centric Automation System

SAIA Agrobotics (operating as SAIA Agrobotics B.V.) is a Dutch agritech company founded around 2017 as a spin-off from Wageningen University & Research. Headquartered in the Netherlands, it is revolutionizing greenhouse tomato cultivation through a fully integrated, plant-centric automation system. Instead of forcing complex robots into dense, traditional plant environments, SAIA “turns it around” by moving plants to the robots. This fundamental redesign simplifies automation, dramatically reduces labor, and boosts efficiency and yields.

The core innovation is a patented continuous cultivation system using aeroponic-like “myst” (nutrient mist) growing without substrate. Plants are grown hanging from above and remain short (rejuvenated by root cutting), allowing them to stay productive for years without seasonal crop changes. This eliminates much of the labor associated with replanting and enables year-round production with higher overall yields (reported potential increases and extended production weeks).

Key elements of the system:

• Cultivation: Plants float freely in a controlled myst environment, staying compact and movable. This supports stable, circular production with minimal waste.
• Vision & Movement: Once a week, plants are gently transported via an industrial chain track from dense growing zones to a spacious automation zone. Spacing increases (e.g., ~1 meter apart), allowing full 360° visibility for AI scanning of plant health, ripeness, and data collection. Each plant is individually tagged and tracked with a unique growing history.
• Robotics: In the automation zone, specialized robots embrace each plant and perform precise tasks in a continuous flow — pruning leaves (e.g., 3 per pass) and harvesting trusses (e.g., 1 per pass) in about 5 seconds per plant. Harvested produce glides gently to conveyors. The design makes automation reliable, fast, and cost-effective, targeting 50%+ labor savings (especially for leaf picking and harvesting, which dominate manual work).

The flagship 1,000 m² automated greenhouse in Ede, Netherlands, has been operational for years and is open for visits by appointment. SAIA claims near-zero manual labor for key tasks, full plant scanning, and significant productivity gains. The system addresses global labor shortages, sustainability, and food security by making high-tech greenhouse farming more accessible and profitable. Recent €10M Series A funding (2025) supports scaling, commercialization, and further development.