Aussie Wine Group's agtech pitch impresses judges at AgSmart

Aussie Wine Group production and design manager Zac Villis was one of five agtech start ups to pitch their innovation at the AgTech Angel Investor Network's Pitch to Paddock competition at AgSmart.

Mr Villis said the machine was a retrofit system that attached to the discharge of a harvester or bin trailer on a vineyard.

"It essentially takes all of the leaves, sticks, wood, and everything like that out of the sample before it goes to the winery, so it all happens in the vineyard," he said.

"The biggest difference between our machine and a lot of other systems out there is that it can be retrofitted to an old harvester to give it new life.

"And it is an eighth of the price of a brand-new harvester."

He said they didn't use the big exhaust fans that were typically on the back of grape harvesters.

"So we found we get a lot of increased weight in the bin from that extra juice that would have gone out the back, upwards of 10pc," he said.

Mr Villis said the machine was born out of a problem his grandfather, a former grape harvest contractor, saw a solution to.

"There was a big push in the US to have a machine that could take the green characters out of the cheap reds, so basically they just wanted to make their cheap wine better," he said.

"And the big thing with mechanical grape harvesting is it's quick and good but you get a lot of byproduct in it.

"So this machine was born out of the idea of getting that out of the harvest."

Aussie Wine Group had its first sale in Australia in 2018, before picking up a huge overseas client.

"In 2019 we got our first customer in the US, and that company themselves picks more grapes than all of Australia combined, so that was huge for us," Mr Villis said.

"They tried the bin trailer unit but they wanted a machine that was on the arm of the harvester, so we went away for a year, developed the arm, did a lot of trial work with Wine Australia and the Australian Wine Research Institute, and then supplied them with the machine.

"They now have six machines in the US and if they continue working the way they are, which they probably will, there should be lots of sales off the back of that which will be really exciting."

They've since had sales into New Zealand, as well.

Mr Villis said it could be hard to get your name out there as a start up.

"If you slapped a John Deere sticker on your machine, you know it would get sales, but when you don't have that same reputation, you've got to work even harder to get your product out there," he said.

"We had a few drip-feed sales in the first few years, but we were lucky that my grandfather had been in the wine industry forever, and he knew people that would be interested in adopting the technology.

"We saw a huge increase after partnering with Wine Australia and getting our trial results validated; that really helped convince a lot of people that it was a good idea.

"Wine Australia did a lot of good in the struggling regions, helping cover the installation costs for some of our machines to try and push the product out there further."

He said they planned to expand their Adelaide workshop and continue pushing the product in Australia and NZ.

They were also doing trials with other industries, including olives and pistachios.

He said the win at AgSmart was "very unexpected".

"I didn't have any idea that I'd do that good in the presentation," he said.

"I'm very thankful for the opportunity, it was good exposure and good to get out there and have a crack."

AgTech Angel Investor Network founder and facilitator Sam Almaliki said the session at AgSmart was the first of the group's Pitch to Paddock series, which would continue to be rolled out at events across the country.

"It was a wonderful success," he said.

"We had a packed room full of farmers, investors and students, and five amazing start ups pitching on their ideas related to the agricultural sector."

He said Aussie Wine Group was a "very-deserving winner" and he looked forward to seeing what it did with its $10,000 prize.