RED Horticulture is a French LED manufacturer, which has only been active in the Dutch greenhouse market for a few years with its innovative lamps. RED’s big difference in approach is that they focus on ‘photobiology’, the knowledge behind lighting crops. By actively supporting customers in the choices they make with lighting, RED engages its customers. This active approach is made possible by the way RED lamps are made: they can be adjusted during cultivation in terms of light colour and intensity per lamp. This gives growers a completely new control, allowing them to adjust cultivation to their own liking (and further fuelling the discussion on number of micromoles vs light colour). RED has already started energetically and hopes to firmly increase its market share in the coming period. To shape this further, RED has set up a number of demonstration-based studies with HortiTech as the implementing party.
HortiTech is a research and demonstration partner of RED. The strength of the cooperation between RED and HortiTech lies mainly in solution-oriented thinking. HortiTech not only looks at what the exact assignment is (for example: carry out a study of X weeks with crop Y), but also looks further into technology, production and marketing, for example. This creates a good interaction between RED, HortiTech and the market.
HortiTech has conducted studies for RED with the crops chrysanthemum, lisianthus and cucumbers. The purpose of these studies is, on the one hand, to find out what the best spectrum is for that type of crop and variety (pure research) and, on the other, to introduce growers to the possibilities of RED lamps (demonstration). During all studies, we always actively sought contact with the target market, by having selected growers participate as trial supervisors, but also by inviting grower groups to see the crop and the lamps. Growers can often only be convinced of the success of something if they can see and interpret it for themselves. Hence HortiTech has that as a starting point in all its research and a connection with the market is necessary.