Monsanto Acquires The Climate Corporation, Posts Loss

Posted by |2 October 2013

Monsanto posted a loss in the fourth quarter of $249 million, or 47 cents per share, compared with a loss of $229 million, or 42 cents per share a year earlier, as expenses rose and sales of soybean and vegetable seeds dropped.

Monsanto also announced it acquired data science provider The Climate Corporation for about $930 million, which it said will expand near- and long-term growth opportunities of its Integrated Farming Systems platform, which is focused on precision agriculture.

CEO Hugh Grant addressed the acquisition on a conference call: “Farmers are today are challenged to make key decisions for their farms in the face of an increasingly volatile weather conditions. Because of this, we believe there is real opportunity and value in working with farmers to manage the risks that affect them every year from planting to harvest. We won’t do that single handedly. It’s an opportunity that cuts across the industry and we’ll use an open-source approach like the one that we’ve used in the past with biotech traits. That means we will prioritize building this platform as a network across all seed companies, our retail partners, equipment leaders and input providers.”

In the fourth quarter, sales in its Agricultural Productivity segment, comprising crop protection products and lawn-and-garden herbicides, were $1.02 billion, compared with $895 million a year ago. Total seeds and genomics sales were $1.12 billion, driven by corn seeds and traits, up from $1.2 billion a year earlier. Soybean sales and traits fell 39% in the quarter to $87 million, while vegetable seeds fell 12% to $250 million.