Greenhouse-A good helper for modern agriculture

Agriculture is a significant contributor to climate change and global food security. The sector is comparable to the world’s backbone, actively nourishing human well-being; however, it also unleashes a great amount of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions into this world.

With a background in engineering and biochip development, Minseok Lee never expected to end up in agriculture. However, a professor's words changed his perspective: "Agriculture is the oldest industry, yet the last to fully benefit from technology. If you apply your experience in managing highly sensitive environments, where even a speck of dust or fluid flow must be controlled, and your curiosity in unexplored areas like biotechnology, you can make a meaningful contribution to humanity through agriculture." Inspired by this, Minseok saw an opportunity to bring structured management and precision to greenhouse environments, much like he had done in highly controlled biotech settings.

Addressing labor challenges with Ation
Labor dependency remains a major challenge in greenhouse management. According to Minseok, "Environmental strategies only work when tasks are executed precisely and on time. But a stable supply of skilled labor is rarely guaranteed." To tackle this, ioCrops developed Ation, a digital system designed to minimize human variability while improving operational reliability.

Ation streamlines daily tasks in three key ways:

• Enabling managers to assign tasks remotely at any time.
• Providing real-time visibility into task progress and workforce allocation.
• Simplifying the reporting and tracking of on-site issues.

An unforeseen advantage of Ation has been its ability to benchmark ioCrops' performance against other greenhouses. 

Similarly, greenhouse technology is only as powerful as the grower's ability to use it effectively.