Agrograde installs automated onion grader at Pimpalgaon market

Agrograde has deployed its GradePlus Pro automated onion grading system at a farmer producer company in Pimpalgaon, Maharashtra. The company says the system can grade up to 10 tonnes an hour, cut grading labour by nearly 80% and improve supply-chain handling for mandi, storage and export use.

— Source published Wed, 19 Aug, 2026, 20:14 IST · First seen Wed, 19 Aug, 2026, 20:20 IST · Source The Hindu BusinessLine

What happened

Agrograde installed its GradePlus Pro automated onion grading system at a farmer producer company in Pimpalgaon, Maharashtra, targeting faster, lower-cost

Key facts

  • Up to 10 tonnes of onions per hour
  • Nearly 80% reduction in grading labour
  • Up to 99% grading accuracy
  • 3-5 times higher throughput than manual grading
  • ₹0.05 per kg grading cost
  • Up to 200 tonnes per day
  • More than 130 machines deployed
  • 14 States
  • Founded in 2018

Why this matters

The Pimpalgaon deployment makes Agrograde a potential partner or acquisition target for agri-logistics, cold-chain and export-platform players seeking quality-control capabilities at the farm-gate.

What to watch

  • Verified daily throughput and machine uptime during peak onion arrivals.
  • Actual labor reduction and grading-cost data versus the claimed ₹0.05 per kg.
  • Improvement in price realization, rejection rates, storage losses and export acceptance for graded lots.
  • Number of additional installations and orders after the first harvest/marketing season.
  • Adoption of batch-level quality records by FPCs, exporters and organized retail procurement teams.
  • Any export-policy changes, onion price controls or mandi restrictions that reduce incentives to invest in premium grading.
  • Track whether Agrograde secures repeat orders from Maharashtra onion FPCs, packhouses, cold-storage operators and exporters.
  • Watch for buyer contracts that explicitly require graded onion specifications, lot traceability or standardized packaging.
  • Assess whether the Pimpalgaon FPC introduces differentiated pricing for export-grade, retail-grade and processing-grade onions.
  • Monitor financing, subsidy or state horticulture support for post-harvest automation and packhouse infrastructure.
  • Look for competing optical sorting, weighing, packing and digital traceability vendors entering Nashik-region mandis.