171: Vertical Farming’s Missing Link: Integrating Greenhouse Wisdom with Wessel van Paassen of Green Simplicity

Wessel van Paassen 00:00:00:

In my way of thinking, the perfect fit for a company like Green Simplicity because we are way, like by far the smallest way in the group, but within the group, we have over 300 employees, almost 400. And yeah, we have a lot of technology in the group, like irrigation. Like stalls is doing irrigation and electron systems. So they have over 80 years of experience in irrigation. Yeah, they have learned. Yeah. Over the years. So much things that, for example, in the horticulture industry, they don't do a lot yet, but when you ask them, yeah, they have everything. What they saw going wrong in vertical farming, they had already solved in horticulture. But, yeah, that's a different world. They were not connected yet.

Harry Duran 00:00:46:

So. Wessel Van Passen, managing director at Green Simplicity, thank you so much for joining me on the vertical farming podcast.

Wessel van Paassen 00:00:51:

You're welcome. Happy to be here.

Harry Duran 00:00:55:

We always have challenges because we're such a global world that managing connections over different time zones sometimes. Yeah, gets to be pretty challenging. So for the benefit of the listener and the viewer, where are you calling in from today?

Wessel van Paassen 00:01:10:

I'm calling in from on Dike. It's a small town in the, like, north of the Netherlands, in North Holland. So, yeah, we are based in the Netherlands.

Harry Duran 00:01:19:

Where you grew up there.

Wessel van Paassen 00:01:20:

Yeah, I always say I'm born in the glass house. My dad and mom had a horticultural company. We got good flower growers in natural soil.

Harry Duran 00:01:29:

Okay.

Wessel van Paassen 00:01:29:

And my brother is now with my dad together and they have over 15 hectares of glass houses. So I learned there, like how a grower thinks, how a plant grows, how you feel climate and how you translate it towards the climate computer and of course the technical. Like it's highly modernized. So the farm. So there are a lot of technique, robots hearing like the robots and machines that automatics leaving and spraying and all kind of things. So, yeah, I am. I'm working on those machines as well in the past and that. Yeah, you learn a lot by troubleshooting and. Yeah. Trying to. To get the farm running as efficient as possible. And that's also.

Harry Duran 00:02:08:

It's been in your family. I mean, so this is all, you know, growing up, I mean, seeing this in your family.

Wessel van Paassen 00:02:13:

Yeah, yeah. I think that the unique thing about my childhood is combining technology and technical experience with plant growth. And I think I'm quite privileged to have a. Yeah. My whole career, my whole childhood, I've been learning. Also being an entrepreneur, of course, in on the dining room, you talk about entrepreneurship, about challenges and that nothing. How do you say that? It never goes like you want. But at the end of the line, you get what you want, but you have to try and keep pushing and finding other ways to make it happen. And at school I had the same. I'm quite. I don't know how you say it in English, dyslexic. So my reading and writing is not always without mistakes, let's say like that. That. But yeah, that's. Yeah, I've. It was a bit of a challenge to. To finish university, but yeah, again, when you have the right spirit and the right drive. Yeah, you can make everything happen that's in work, the same. So, yeah.

Harry Duran 00:03:16:

Where did you learn that discipline? And is that something just from watching your family?

Wessel van Paassen 00:03:20:

Yeah, I think in the business and in the company. Yeah, like when something doesn't work out, you have to make sure at the end of the line works out. So, yeah, find a way. And we are also not afraid to call for help or to search for the right solution. And yeah, like when I'm in a restaurant, I'm not looking at the food, I'm looking at how much people do that work, where are plugs in the wall for power and all kind of things. Yeah, it's. It's just something. What you do to. Yeah, it's business wise, you want to understand what's happening, but also technology wise, you want to understand.

Harry Duran 00:03:52:

It reminds me of that scene from Bourne Identity when Jason Bourne is in the restaurant but he's looking. Yeah, yeah, exactly 10 different things happening at the same time and then the person is not even noticing all those things.

Wessel van Paassen 00:04:04:

So.

Harry Duran 00:04:04:

But it seems. Is this. Do you remember this from your childhood, that you were always just naturally curious because there's always stories of being born into a business of a family, and then the children, like, have no interest in the business and they go do something else. So for you, was it always this sense of curiosity? Because it sounds like you do have a love for.

Wessel van Paassen 00:04:22:

No, absolutely. And it was always like when we had a broken computer, we took it apart before we demolished it completely. So first you want to know, like, how it's built up and why and when you. When there's something small broken, even like your headset or your mouse or whatever or something else in the kitchen, you take it apart and look if you can fix it and if not, you throw it away. And if you can, you would just fix it with some cable binders or whatever, what. What was needed. So, yeah.

Harry Duran 00:04:47:

So for the people who have not heard of Green Simplicity, can you give the overview of what it is you provide and who your clients are just for an overview that's helpful.

Wessel van Paassen 00:04:56:

Now, I started green splicity 10 years ago and we started with building research chambers for growers to do plant research. And I always say my goal was to make plant research accessible for growers and to find out what is the plant potential. Because when you know what the potential of the crop is, if a grower grows in the glass house, he doesn't know. And I was also questioning myself in the glass house from my dad. Is this 80% of what this plant can do or is this 66 or is it 95 or whatever? And when you put a plant in a room where you can change all the variables in plant growth, you also know what you can still can read. So let's say this is 100%. And you don't look at cost, you only look at what can the plant do when all conditions are good and you see that the glass house is doing this. You also know what steps you have to make to reach on higher output. And that doesn't mean you have to take away the sunlight, or you have to add additional light, or you have to make the climate better, or you have to do a different irrigation strategy. So we started in building research chambers which can be rent out or rent by a customer, or leased or just being bought. And they are able to change light settings. So they have a lot of different compartments. Most of the time, 9 or 21 compartments. You can play around with light intensity, light colors, with of course, irrigation strategy, either from the bottom, from the top. They can play with CO2 levels, temperatures, humidities, fertilizer recipes, etc. And you can find, and I was steering customers and growers towards how can you, as fast as possible, find the plant potential. There were two good things about this. One, I learned a lot about what is possible for different crops. You can save old plants, flowering old plants, herbs, lettuce, but also cannabis and propagation of all kinds of things, germination of seeds. And you cannot imagine. And we have tried it with our customers, we have now over 70 climate change running throughout Europe. And we see a lot of things. And I saw during like the first years of trialing, I saw like the advantages of for example, propagation, propagation in controlled environment versus propagation in a glass house. You saw the differences in the potential, what it can do like after, in the production phase, after propagation, like when you make a better plant, which is more uniform, has more growing power, a better root system. When you put this plant in a glass house, where per plants per square meter, you go way lower than the propagation yeah, when this plant is faster or you can produce more kilos of more flowers per square meter. That's very interesting. So I saw I have to make sure when a customer wants to scale up, I have a system for it. And we are always playing with light in a larger environment. I think we have now installed over 110,000 square meters of indoor lighting in only in the Netherlands already. And that's mainly tulips, but also propagation of. Yeah, a lot of propagation in tulips, let's say like this, but also some letter, some cannabis, et cetera. But we have a lot of experience in lighting, but all kind of different recipes compared with the large glass house light suppliers. And that's because in the large glass houses you have daylight and additional lighting is needed and you want. There is only one thing that matters is growth. As much growth as possible and as production as possible. Yeah, then you have low amounts of blue, a little bit of green because it's less efficient and the rest is red and a little bit of far right if needed now. And we are in controlled environments without daylight most of the time. With complicated crops like tulip, you can do with a very small amount of light, you can do a lot of things like high amounts of far red. You can change the plant shape, spread the leaves, you can change the height of the bud, you can change the length of the crop. And that's very interesting. And yeah, there we make a lot of differences in light. So coming back.

Harry Duran 00:09:00:

Yeah. So I'm curious. Obviously Holland has a rich history in tulips, as everybody knows. And obviously the Dutch have pioneered greenhouses. When did the industry start to become interested or start experimenting with pure indoor, like you said, research facilities or moving, relying solely on greenhouses? Obviously. When did you start to see that shift or is that something, you know, going even back before your time that before you started.

Wessel van Paassen 00:09:27:

Yeah, people were.

Harry Duran 00:09:28:

Before we started seeing the ability of.

Wessel van Paassen 00:09:30:

That approach before we started. Of course, a lot of people try to like force a tulip into like the bulb darker at harvested on the field. When they're big enough, they're being brought into the forcing season and then they being like transformed into a cut flower and the rest of the bulbs are too small. They go back on the field, they get harvest. They get planted in October and harvested the July, June, July after. And then you have more bulbs and also bigger bulbs. When the bulbs are big enough, they go go into the glass house and they get the force to a cut flower tube. Of course, people were trialing and stuff in Inside those, inside their glass houses with some LEDs or some TL tubes, like fluorescent tubes in the past. And I saw that happening and I was walking around with a spectrometer. I went to a few growers because they're like this part of the of the Netherlands. I think 3 billion tulips come from here. So it's crazy. It's very like combined into one area. So I was in the spot and I had some knowledge about light. So I was just friends of mine, two friends or I have two big tulip growers. So yeah, we just started conversation with some beers and I asked like, what are you guys doing? You have one blue light and like fluorescent tubes and a white one and that's connected. And how does it work? We don't know. You get more length with blue. I said no, you don't get more length with blue. And so that was funny. So I was like discovering a little bit what was happening like on the light part in the tulip sector. And I saw that the knowledge was very limited and I had of course tools to research. So I throw some of those research chambers full of tulips and I just starting to play around with a lot of green and a lot of blue and a lot of far red and mixtures and a lot of higher intensities, low intensities. And yeah, in moments I saw what was possible. And then I showed some of those things to some tuberculos and said, this is not possible. Yeah. I said come take a look, it's possible. Yeah. And then I started to roll it out and more and more people started, okay, yeah, we have a high glass house. Yeah, just put two layers in and I'll fix the climate in the bottom layer as well and the lighting and then the other layer was just daylight and natural control by the glass house climate computer. So yeah, we started to also install climate systems. And to come back to your first question, why, what are we doing now? We started with research chambers but now we're building large scale vertical farms, indoor farms, but also glass houses with multiple layers. And we are not a company that is like on the forehand. Like we are not pushing in terms of publicity and we don't have massive budget to, to go to every exhibition in the world and to say and tell how good or what we do. But we just build systems in practice and make things work. And I think now is the moment for green simplicity to also start to, to push a little bit more and to also show the world what we can build and what we already have built because I get groups of people like over from Australia, but also us, Canada, all kind of, all kind of parts of the world. Also a lot of from Europe of course to see what we do. And we also have a lot of projects what we can show. We always have like companies, customers where we can just walk in with people. I can show you a small tour of three companies. We always do the same tour. Like when we have a group over and we have like in the region where we are, we see a tulip farm of three layers high with LEDs and it's completely built by GreenV and we show an indoor propagation facility built in a glass house with only two layers. So that's the practical way of doing vertical farming and also the cheap way of doing vertical farming. And we have a complicated vertical farm where we have stacked four layers in four meter high, fully automated. And this is more, a little bit more expensive but also like room technically it's way more interesting. So yeah, we started to shift from gaining knowledge, doing research with customers and providing those research chambers we still do towards roll it out in the large scale. And I always say we are good at playing the game with climate lighting automation software, like folding this around the plant and make it work. And I think those last two things are most important. Yeah, we have to make sure that some, when a customer wants to build something or we want to solve a problem, that we can help them solving the problem from A to Z and not only ask him what do you need? And then put yes, yes, yes. And we build it and it doesn't work. Yeah, sorry, it doesn't work. Yeah, this is what you asked to us, the world. No, we will build it and make sure it works. And I think that's the difference. And we can do that because we also have a little bit of plant knowledge or a lot of flaw knowledge and practical knowledge also from the horticultural industry.

Harry Duran 00:14:16:

Yeah, I was curious about that. So I started this podcast in 2020 at the peak or someone called the Hype.

Wessel van Paassen 00:14:24:

Top of the hype.

Harry Duran 00:14:25:

So I'm curious, a little bit of hype. But I'm curious obviously from your perspective, from your like family history of greenhouses, when did you start to see that, you know, people, you know, some of what you were doing was already considered vertical farming because you're already in a controlled environment, you're doing something in containers, these research. But when did you start to become aware that there was an interest or maybe too much of an interest in vertical farming without taking into consideration all the learnings and the lessons that, you know, obviously the greenhouse industry has provided. Curious about your perspective.

Wessel van Paassen 00:14:56:

I always have. I followed vertical farming from day one. Of course I was in the business more from horticultural perspective. And I will just choose the route. I think it's most logical and for me as a person and also for the horticultural industry. So I saw, okay, vertical farming is interesting, but the question is, yeah, in the Netherlands, no way. And then the question is where and when? And what I found most interesting is the scale. It's very small. Like even 5,000 square meter vertical farm, in my opinion is very small. We have here a glass house of 60,000 square meters and that's a normal size glass house. And when a grower has 20,000 square meters, he is too small to exist in the Netherlands. So yeah, why should you have 20,000 square meters? That's a little bit the way how I got raised in this industry and also the diversity of crops I want to grow. I want to grow lettuce, herbs, all kinds of different things together. You cannot do one, you do everything, you do half. It's on one big compromise. And we grow one variety. And my dad said, I don't want to have from the same variety, two colors because it's less efficient. Yeah. And that's. So it's all about efficiency. It's all about optimalization. It's all about lower your cost price, otherwise you cannot exist. And the funny thing is I always said I never saw a tomato grower developing his own irrigation system, his own irrigation unit, his own software in the vertical farm. This all happens. And yeah, I was looking a little bit like from a distance, like why and how. And I know why and I know how, because it was not existing yet. But it was existing. But yeah, the people who started vertical farming and doing making that bigger, they didn't know about the horticultural industry. And the horticultural industry was not saying, oh, we, let's make something that works. Now when somebody asks a question, can you put an irrigation system into a vertical farm? Yeah, of course we can supply an irrigation system. But they didn't had a lot of experience with the layers and with the height you have to pull water. And so it's not easy, let's say like that. And it just depends on the place in the world where you are and what knowledge is there and how far you can look into finding the knowledge. And you saw also companies who had something. For example, you have those racks with an elevator in the middle where you can put benches in. Yeah, that rack was made to store parts. And then somebody thought, oh, let's put plants in there and light and climate. And then we have a perfect vertical farm. Now, of course, it's not a perfect vertical farm, but it's just a vertical farm that's made out of a machine that was already existing. But yeah, ask myself, when I have a white sheet of paper where you have to build the most ultimate vertical farm, how you're going to do that then? And every time when you have a new customer with new building, you have to start with a clean sheet of paper. You have to put a building what he bought on there. And then you look, okay, this doesn't make sense. That does make sense. And then you're going to find like parts together to make something that works. And throughout the years I have been in vertical farming projects. For example, Yasaya was involved. We did the first phase, the second phase. Yeah, what was happening there, I was not happy about. I got around the table. Let's. Can you help integrating everything? I said, yeah, okay, you're giving a white sheet of paper now it's not there. We already have bought this and this in this. Okay, so that's not interesting, but yeah. Can you do the climate? Of course. And then I asked the party who was doing the internal transport. Yeah, can you drill some holes there and there? Because you still have to make it. No, no, it's not possible because all standard now. Okay, fine. So the customer was climbing into this rack, drilling everywhere holes. And I thought, yeah, it has just been built from top to bottom, so why not putting those holes in the right place directly? And then you have to install lights and ducting and everything. And everything. Yeah. It was one big inefficient building process. And when I was looking there, I was like, this should be different, but it cannot be done when the customer is a system integrator. Because when a customer is system integrated, you choose a random group of people and put them around the table. So, guys, I bought everything from everyone. I built something, I bought something, make the best possible system. Now, I can tell you it's never going to happen. So I thought when I do this, when I take this role as system integrator, I choose the parties where, what have the best technology or the best solution or the best product or whatever and then make something that works and how to make climate and how to bring air uniformly at this plant and how. Where to suck it away in different systems with different heights. Yeah. Then you can play a little bit the game like, oh, this customer has One layer. Sometimes we start with customers. Yeah, I want the farm. Now you want to grow a proper plant and what kind of room you have. And if we can do one layer and better as one layer because it's way cheaper in terms of growing square meters and then you end up in making a little bit bigger room with one layer. Keep it simple. Manual benching system. Yeah. And they maybe pay like 1 or 2/3 of the investment cost of a vertical farm. And we like to play this game and also have a discussion with a grower or an investor like you like, growing vertically is not a goal on itself. You have to find the business case. That's right. You have to find the technology that fits with this building and fits around the crop. And I think the vertical farming business as it is now will change to less layers to in my opinion, using very cheaply horticultural structure which is isolated as a building around your vertical farm. Because why building an industrial hall? Yeah, we're building a duch because then when it doesn't work, we can still sell this hall as an industrial building. So you think already about an exit before you started that in my opinion, then you don't have the right plan. And of course from an investor point of view, I understand. So of course, yeah, there are always reasons.

Harry Duran 00:21:04:

I have to have a backup plan.

Wessel van Paassen 00:21:05:

You always have to have a backup plan. But when you look at the most ideal third farm, I think it's three layers, a glass house of six meters high and just building like we have glass houses here, such big surfaces of glass house. It's not that land is an issue. In some parts in the world it is an issue. But when you go 50km further, for example, it's no issue anymore. Or to the left or to the right or whatever. But yeah.

Harry Duran 00:21:32:

So how much of this do you think is just obviously a learning experience and maybe more conversations like you're saying with folks in the vertical farming industry who thought there was one way of doing things and like you said, they come from a modular approach. Let's put these LEGO pieces together and then we have a farm. So it feels like now there's more of a wake up call. Obviously there's been a lot of companies that have gone bankrupt and or have had to restructure because the model didn't work. And they were thinking more as a technology company as opposed to actual a farm. And we need growers and we need people to know how to grow. So it's been very sobering and I'm sure it's been very Interesting for you to watch from your perspective. So how much of this is like maybe some re education when you speak to people, potential partners and clients?

Wessel van Paassen 00:22:16:

Yeah. What I find very nice to see is that for example in 80 acres you have some other examples. They started on time to make the switch from doing everything and have to be system integrated, have to supply all the technology by okay, what is the most important we have to grow good product and we have our own optimum farm blueprint. And when you focus on growing and of course sales of your product is also very important and you leave technical companies to build your system as you want, then you have a lot less work and you also have more focus on the thing that's important. And I think you see the good the bigger vertical farming companies that succeed, that prove that there is a business model, they did that on time or focusing enough on growing and optimizing their growing system and their blueprint or their software but not try to do everything because you cannot be a system integrator, a technology supplier, a grower and then also sell the system worldwide at different locations. It's all in my opinion too big. I don't know. I maybe know one or two growers that have multiple locations in multiple countries from glass houses. Now why is that? Because it's quite hard to grow efficient plants and you have to be always on the spot and always there to make sure it works and to be there. It's 247 business and not closing the door at Friday, opening at Monday. Yeah. Then yeah. When your pump doesn't work for irrigation or whatever. So I think that will change that technology suppliers like let us build the farm, we design it together and we should make sure in the design process that everyone is confident about everything and that everything will work from day one. And starting a business, starting a vertical farm and said we will probably have 60% of the production the first year and that's a no go for me. That's impossible. I've never saw a glass house. I saw my dad building a glass house. I was there myself for three times like years after years. Yeah. From day one it has to go full and it has to go perfect. Otherwise you fail.

Harry Duran 00:24:35:

What's the point?

Wessel van Paassen 00:24:36:

So yeah, that's a little bit of standard where what is normal for us.

Harry Duran 00:24:40:

And yeah, yeah, it's an interesting perspective. So I'm curious you obviously we connected because my partner Supper met you at Fintech and so you said you're spending, you've been in business for 10 years but you're trying to get the word out about what you. And what's your experience when you go to these conferences and you speak to people and people come to the booth and talk to me a little bit about what you're seeing, what you're asking.

Wessel van Paassen 00:25:02:

So last year I sent, I had a new colleague, he was, I said, you have to discover this whole farming industry and go to those conferences, et cetera. But he left after I think half a year or so because he said, yeah, I want to sell something every day. Yeah, it doesn't work like that. You are worth on a project for half a year and maybe you sell it, maybe not. But now I started to do it myself because I have to, because I find it interesting. But yeah, you have to make the time. And I went to for example, Akon last year. Yeah, it's nice to see, to find, to feel a little bit industry. But yeah, I was of course at a conference and I was like, yeah, for me it's a lot of talking and a lot of examples and people talking about like how a farm can run and where you should look at if you want to start a farm. And that's all logical, but for me I rather sit around the table with a client talking about the design of the farm and about how we make sure it really works and have a good discussion together how to optimize things or how to make it like the perfect combination of the different technologies. And yeah, so the idea of what I had is there is a lot of talking and not so much doing, but that's of course in a lot of industries and there are happily a lot of people that have the courage to start a vertical farm. And I think that's also the companies where we should be in contact with. And yeah, we rather talk to a grower than an investor and because with a grower you can talk about more about the prompt and about the production, about how to optimize things. Investor, that takes a different and different route. Then you have to talk about the CapEx, the OpEx and about how much kilo you can produce in a system. Yeah, of course at the moment we talk to growers and they already know how to grow and we can help them in growing in a different way, like growing indoors instead of in a glass house. And when you say ah, you have to look at this or look at that, they directly do it and they see, oh, that works. Interesting. Ah, this is nothing you have on a daily basis sometimes contact with customers which just bought a new system. Yeah, and that's nice. Because then you know, you go to the limit of what you can get from a system of out of a system in terms of production.

Harry Duran 00:27:19:

When you're having these conversations, are you noticing any trends in terms of more interest from certain parts of the world? Obviously, you know, people come to the Dutch for their experience in greenhouses but you know, we're seeing hybrid approaches now. Do you see more regions that are maybe because of climate change issues, but are just expressing more of an interest in finding solutions for their problems?

Wessel van Paassen 00:27:42:

Yeah, like I don't think I have a good overview of the world in terms of vertical farming. So let's say like that. But yeah, being at Aircon in Las Vegas or being in greentech. Yeah, you see that in my opinion the vertical farming market starting to some new project or expansion plans are there. So that's very nice. I heard also the Middle east there are some projects. But then when you ask about the pictures or you look where are the pictures on the Internet, you don't see them. So then the question is yeah, or the question is it still signature or is it also something being built? And I also am very realistic. We are with 12 people within green Simplicity. We cannot be everywhere in the world at the moment. But maybe it's also good to mention we caught part of green V two years ago. So May 22, no, May 23 and we started to switch our focus of course because we were doing research chambers, we were doing indoor vertical farming solutions for propagation and etc. And now we have a group of companies because Green V is a group of companies owned by Hong investments. I sold 100% of my shares on GreenV but I bought a lot back in GreenVee of that money. What I got for Green V of Green Simplicity to. Because I was just started and I didn't want to stop, I want to go faster further. And with a group like Green V like whole investment which is above, it's a very strong company within the Netherlands. They have a lot of own money which they invest in all long term investments into. Yeah companies where they have a like a longer term plan for. So also greenview was the plan for greenv is to be in certain focus parts in the world the supplier for horticultural technology. Either a customer wants to have a turnkey greenhouse for tomatoes, lettuce or whatsoever or only an irrigation system. We should be there to build and to service. Yeah. And that was of course in my way of thinking the perfect fit for a company like Green Simplicity. Because yeah, we are way like by far the smallest within the group. But within the group we have over 300 employees, almost 400. And yeah, we have a lot of technology in the group like irrigation, like stalls is doing irrigation and electoral systems. So they have over 80 years of experience in irrigation. Yeah, they have learned, yeah over the years so much things that for example in the horticulture industry they don't do a lot yet. But when you ask them, yeah, they have everything what they saw going wrong in the vertical farming they had already solved in horticulture. But yeah, that's a different world. They were not connected yet. And for example fossil does. Yeah, heating, cooling systems, climate systems, but also isolation of piping, welding, etc. Then it's HD for boom. That's the logo over here, it's mirrored but that's internal transport automation. So they do one layer or multiple layer glass houses and automation from A to B with benches but also taking the trays on the table, bringing it back on or sorting plans, etc. And then we have Prince, it's glass house builder. They do constructions for glass houses but also with IPM roofs. So with isolated roofs but also screens, intake netting, et cetera. Then we have a few, part of a few companies that do different things that are sales representatives in different places in the world. So we have Prince USA that's based in the US and we have Apex which is based in Australia and New Zealand and then we have JV Energy which is based in Canada and we have Greenview Mexico which is based in Mexico. And they are like some of them have 40 people on the staff and some of them have six but they teams which build projects from the ground up and yeah that's. We have now built some different projects throughout the world together with the companies within the group. And whereas Greensplicity started to very fast move things towards the companies within the group. For example, building the climate chambers is now doing is now be done by Stolza because yeah, we are doing that in a small shed here or outside and they have a very, very nice professional workshop with all the tools and materials and it's irrigation, it's some electricity, it's some construction that they can. It was a perfect fit. So I always looking at where is somebody good at and is it better off there than. Than with us. And within the group is easy because you have no boundaries of any kind. So that's, that's quite easy to move that. And HDFABHM is active in almost all projects. What we do in vertical farming, indoor farming and propagation because they do all the labor the automation. We moved all the software into the software from HCV Boom. So, for example, when you put a plant in your vertical farm or indoor farm, you say this is the perfect growing recipe and this is the root water will go. Then the lights automatically switch to the right spectrum. The irrigation booms or the irrigation for ebb and flood on the side is being adjusted on that bench. And the recipe is just count down the days. And so, yeah, you have really a full integration about all the technology that's in a farm. And when you buy as a vertical farm operator somewhere, some stuff, yeah, it will never talk to each other like that because yeah, then people have to integrate that together. And then you're like, yeah, the control of the light. We cannot show everything because yeah, then that software is also in the other software. And then you always have boundaries in terms of what you show to your competitor or to your. To another supplier. And that was also what I was facing. I was to optimize our systems. I was sometimes afraid to share everything what I wanted to have because I thought, yeah, when Faboom can do it themselves, then they don't need us again after maybe three years. And then, yeah, they are bigger. So they. And yeah, then they got one of a group and then it's like, oh, okay, yeah, that's even worse maybe. But yeah, and I also didn't like to put things in contracts and work with patents and everything because it's all paperwork. We just want to build something that works and don't do the paperwork, for example. And yeah, that's a little bit of a.

Harry Duran 00:34:09:

So I think what's interesting about all the different moving parts is sometimes when people are thinking about starting a farm, I don't know if they can think that far ahead. And obviously from your experience, you know, all the time you've spent in the industry, it's almost like you can see all the moving parts and maybe think about the things that they're not thinking about. And you're probably thinking three, four steps ahead, maybe three, four years ahead. You know, what could break into these systems, how long these typically these types of connections, you know, what's the weakest link in this chain? And I feel like you've done all this work and found the right integrators and the right partners. So I think the benefit of working with someone like Green Simplicity is this idea that you have the experience and you can walk them through, because a lot of times, you know, they're just thinking about their one crop or, you know, not even Thinking about the different businesses or parts of the business that could be effective.

Wessel van Paassen 00:34:59:

Yeah, no, I agree.

Harry Duran 00:35:00:

There's a lot. It sounds like there's always a lot on your plate and there's always something that you're thinking about. What's a tough question you've had to ask yourself recently?

Wessel van Paassen 00:35:08:

How can I place myself in the role where the company goes fast? So fast forward as possible. I'm only 34, but I'm good at bringing technology together and I'm not afraid to sell something and make sure it works. And we are not a company that has to raise 10 million or more to make something to prove they built something that works. No, we just sell something and then we make sure it works. And I always say under pressure everything gets fluid. So you have to make sure it works at the ends of the line. And what I now see is as a small company, we have to grow. And that's working out quite well at the moment. We have all our systems in place. We have CRM, erp, everything. What we didn't have two years ago, we all have it in place. And we have a group of companies around us which have unlimited people and resources, et cetera. So, yeah, I think now is the moment the projects should be bigger and should get bigger. That's what happens also when you look at our pipeline. Yeah, and then it's starting to get excited and I think, yeah, questioning myself how fast. The faster that moment will come, the better. And then we have to make sure we are ready for growth. And yeah, then it's important that I already look at the next system and the next concept, next crops. We have now like multiple systems for propagation. Yeah, we. Like this is something what we should sell. And we have to start inventing the next thing already. For example, strawberries or for cucumbers or for whatever. And then the question what is the right move? When. Yeah, and that's.

Harry Duran 00:36:44:

And also it seems like getting the word out and being at these conferences and letting people know what your DNA is. Right. Like that you have this experience where you started and showing people like you've been doing a lot of the research, so you're prepared to move into these other crops. Who would. When you think about people coming to you and being prepared, like when you think of an ideal client or someone who's, who would be a good partner to work with. Green simplicity. What are the characteristics that come to mind?

Wessel van Paassen 00:37:10:

Somebody who knows what they want in terms of growth, what do you want to grow? And yeah, taking people that have technical knowledge is Also nice because then they also understand what you do and why you do some things. And also good to a customer. Yeah, you can brainstorm a little bit with or have a nice discussion with about what is the best option. Yeah. So it. But it doesn't have to necessarily be a grower. We also talk with investors, which is also sometimes really like eye opening and interesting because they ask other questions and then when you think, yeah, yeah, that's a good question. And yeah, we still have no answer. So we should have an answer in, in half a year from now, for example. Like we are not a company that can say, oh, we, we prove that you can produce 120 kilos of lettuce. Now I just say I've never done lettuce. Of course we do, but let's say I've never done lettuce. But yeah, if you now produce 80 kilos and your climate is this, I know it will be better because our climate is just spot on and we have uniform light distribution. Uniform and air distribution. So we just look at what is different or better in terms of what you now have or what you have experienced together. We can find like different ways of growing or different growing. Like holders, for example, meteor systems or other parties that they have proven that they have good production numbers on their holder on a bench. Yeah, this is something what we have also with the customer. You have now a tray. But yeah, when you switch to a different holder which have proved themselves with the right climate, with the right fertilizer composition, etc. Yeah. Then we look. Of course, I cannot tell you how much you are going to grow if you say we want to grow in a special gel what nobody have seen. Yeah, yeah. I don't know. But what we can do is making a proper climate and make this plant move fully automatic automatically through a chamber and make the growing conditions around this plant optimal for growing. And what, yeah, what is the additional or the end of the line the prediction will be? Yeah, we don't know yet.

Harry Duran 00:39:12:

There's so many variables. Right. You talk about the climate, you talk about the lighting, you talked about the substrate, you know, and every little thing you change is going to have an effect. And if you don't have a process for measuring this, which I think you've become very good at, I think you don't know where your growth is coming from. And I think that's the most important thing.

Wessel van Paassen 00:39:29:

Yeah.

Harry Duran 00:39:31:

So as we wrap up, I like to leave a little room at the end of these conversations to have more collaboration within vertical farming because like you said, mentioned like it was a bit of a siloed approach. And sometimes people are like holding things close to their vest and I don't want people to see my secret sauce or something. So we're trying to establish more collaboration, sort of what you see at these conferences. Is there any thoughts you have guidance for? Especially because of this background that you have, this rich background and history in glasshouses. So when you think about speaking to a vertical farming audience, so that we have a lot of, you know, your colleagues in vertical farming listening, what are some thoughts that come to mind?

Wessel van Paassen 00:40:12:

Yeah, you see already it's switching a bit, but sharing knowledge and sharing expertise and opening your farm to other like competitors. But the competitors, like the. They're not competitors. But we always say there are together, you have to compete with the lettuce from the field or to a chocolate or whatever. So at the ends of line, your colleagues and I think sharing technology and. But also numbers with colleagues is very important. And I know from a few, like larger vertical farming companies, they're starting doing that and that's very important. Like in the glasses industry, my dad is in a group with I think 20 colleagues. And they all calculate everything. They do. If it's use of fertilizer or energy input or labor number per stem harvested, they put everything, calculate back to square meters or 200 stems harvested, and they can see every month all the numbers from all the companies and then they sit together. Why do you have so less fertilizer usage? Why do you have so less labor? Yeah, I just have an automatic sleeping robot. Oh, that's interesting. Okay. And what did it cost? And you have the discussion internally together with your colleagues or competitors about such small details. And of course you can hold back the things where it's about your software or your fertilizer composition because. Yeah, whatever, that's detail. But it's more to trigger each other. Why you're doing so much production or so much efficiency. It's to make sure. Yeah. You go together to a higher level and trigger each other. I think that's sharing knowledge is very important. And we are also. We are not. Oh, we cannot share the spectrum or we cannot share. We throw everything on the table. We show you from day one, we show you all the farms. Yeah. When we think, oh, that's an interesting glory to look, you know, to get it. Let's go to this rover and look. And I also don't like technical companies, our colleagues, as competitors, that they cannot show a running vertical farm. Of course, you have built vertical Farms. Let's go to one and see what's happening and how it works, because that's what it's about. We can talk about a lot of things. We can put moving pixels on the computer and. But yeah, seeing is believing. And yeah, I always say talk to my customer and don't involve me. Then you know the real story. And then, yeah, that's very important.

Harry Duran 00:42:29:

And I think it's a good lesson to learn because it's a model that's been proven to work because it's not like these conversations are happening and then people are stealing secrets and companies are going out of business. This has been happening for decades in this industry. And the saying here is a rising tide lifts all boats. It's the same concept of, like, we all rise together. But, you know, if we have to think of the bigger picture of the industry because there are competing forces from outside. And I think it's a valuable lesson to learn and hopefully it's been a sobering one over the past few years with all the exits and the bankruptcies that maybe there is a need to have some more conversations. So I'm glad you said that because I think it's really, it's important. It's probably one of the ways in which this industry is going to move forward.

Wessel van Paassen 00:43:13:

I really hope this time will turn and that. That the bankruptcy wave is now over and that the vertical farming companies that come new choose proven technical supplier and start focusing on growing and start focusing on optimizing their own farm and their own.

Harry Duran 00:43:29:

Well, I want to thank you for making the time to come on the podcast. I know it's been a challenge with the scheduling, but it's really interesting to see your perspective on the industry and all, especially all the experience you have with your family heritage. So I'm really glad we got connected and I'm excited to share this with my listeners. So where's the best place for folks to get connected with you and the company? So we'll make sure we have the all the links in the show notes and we'll have your connection to your LinkedIn page as well. So I really appreciate your time, Russell. I really enjoyed this conversation. Thank you.