Lindsay & Farmers Edge To Offer Innovative Irrigation Solution

Lindsay Corporation (NYSE:LNN) has entered into a partnership with a global leader in digital agriculture, Farmers Edge, to connect and digitize two million irrigated acres by the end of 2021. The companies will integrate their digital platforms to provide crop management solutions to growers and dealers.

Both companies intend to expand their digital partnership in data science, machine learning, and AI-driven analytics, in order to deliver highly-precise water-based solutions and predictive models.

Per the strategic initiative, Lindsay will be provided access to Farmers Edge’s high-resolution satellite imagery and the most comprehensive field-centric dataset. Together Lindsay's irrigation management platform — FieldNET Advisor and Farmers Edge fully-integrated, AI-driven farm management platform — FarmCommand allow growers to access digital tools that deliver real-time information related to crop health as well as identify issues regarding seeding errors, tile drainage, weather damage, pests, disease, and more. Consequently, the collaboration of the companies will enable growers to make more informed water-management decisions to optimize applications and yield potential. Further, Farmers Edge will provide Lindsay's FieldNET Pivot Watch and FieldNET Advisor solutions to help growers better understand irrigation techniques.

Moreover, the integration effort will aid growers to utilize high-resolution satellite imagery tool to monitor crop health from the convenience of their laptops or smartphones. This apart, the connected farm strategy will help growers collect field data and feed the information into FieldNET Advisor and FarmCommand.

Lindsay is focused on aiding growers to increase water and energy efficiency and profit, while also concentrating on sustainable farming practices through digitization.

Lindsay’s FieldNET Advisor enables growers to maximize profitability through better irrigation management by helping them maximize their yield output and crop performance, reduce input costs, and conserve water, save time and labor by providing quick, simple, intuitive irrigation management recommendations and alerts. The company remains focused on its strategy to expand global reach with FieldNET Advisor. During fourth-quarter fiscal 2019, the company released access to satellite imagery for all FieldNET Advisor customers. Interest in FieldNET Advisor continues to rise as evident from an improvement of 78% in the number of year-over-year subscriptions. Lindsay has also introduced Field NET Pivot Watch, a low-cost solar-powered remote telemetry device that mounts onto any central pivot irrigation system.

Nevertheless, agricultural markets have been affected by lower commodity prices and reduced exports as a result of the long-standing U.S-China trade dispute and the weakening currency. This has been affecting demand for irrigation equipment in North America and is a drag on Lindsay’s revenues.

Price Performance

The company’s shares have gained 11.2% over the past year, compared to the industry's growth of 12.6%.

Zacks Rank & Stocks to Consider

Lindsay currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold).

Some better-ranked stocks in the Industrial Products sector are Cintas Corporation (NASDAQ:CTAS) , Chart Industries, Inc. (NASDAQ:GTLS) and DXP Enterprises, Inc. (NASDAQ:DXPE) , each carrying a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy), at present. You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

Cintas has an expected earnings growth rate of 15.6% for the current year. The stock has rallied 56% over the past year.

Chart Industries has a projected earnings growth rate of 73.6% for 2020. The company’s shares have gained 6% over the past year.

DXP Enterprises has an estimated earnings growth rate of 10.5% for the ongoing year. In a year’s time, the stock has appreciated 37.3%.

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