Valtech, the experience innovation company, today announced it has been awarded second place at the PostNL Innovation & AI Award, part of the Shopping Awards, for its work with The Greenery. The recognition highlights Valtech’s role in designing and delivering YieldWizard — an AI-powered solution that shifts fresh produce quality management from reactive inspection to proactive, data-driven decision-making.
Developed in just six weeks through Valtech’s Innovation Marathon, YieldWizard predicts the likelihood of product rejection before harvest. By combining grower and cultivation data, weather insights, historical quality data and product characteristics, Valtech built a prediction model with high accuracy. The solution also introduces “intelligent matching,” aligning predicted batch quality with B2B customer profiles to improve allocation, reduce waste and increase margin.
“What makes the Innovation Marathon so powerful is how quickly you move from a clear idea to something that actually works. Together with The Greenery, we started with a concrete business challenge and, in just a few weeks, built an AI solution that predicts strawberry quality and delivers a huge impact in their daily operations. It’s making a real difference by helping the business move from reactive decisions to much more proactive steering,” says Mark Passtoors, AI Client Strategy at Valtech.
From AI concept to operational impact in weeks
The solution is delivering measurable results, including:
- Improved product accuracy and more precise batch allocation
- Reduced dock inspections with more targeted quality control
- Lower waste and fewer customer claims
- Greater predictability across the supply chain
This impact — and the speed at which it was achieved — was key to the recognition from the jury, as highlighted by Pablo van Vierzen, Business Digital Transformation Lead at The Greenery:
“What I really appreciated was the focused, fast-paced approach of the Valtech Innovation Marathon. We started with a clear idea addressing a real business challenge, and within 42 days developed an AI solution with strong potential to scale. Beyond the efficiency gains, it’s especially rewarding to receive recognition from an institution like the Shopping Awards. We’re very proud to have achieved second place alongside leading B2C brands.”
A scalable foundation for future innovation
While initially developed for strawberries, YieldWizard is designed as a scalable model that can be extended to additional product categories and enhanced with new data sources. The award jury noted strong potential for further development, recognizing the solution as both innovative and highly practical for real-world application.
Valtech’s recognition at the PostNL Innovation & AI Awards underscores its ability to rapidly translate advanced technologies into solutions that drive meaningful business outcomes for clients.
About The Greenery
The Greenery is a market-driven sales organization in fruit and vegetables, with a unique structure: it is owned by the growers who are members of its cooperative. For these growers, it manages the year-round sales of their products to European retailers, wholesalers, foodservice companies, and the processing industry.
With more than 900 colleagues, The Greenery works every day on safe, sustainable, and innovative supply chain solutions, ensuring that fresh products move quickly and efficiently from grower to customer. In this way, it strengthens the position of its growers while providing consumers with healthy food.
About Valtech
Valtech, the global leader in experience innovation, exists to unlock a better way to experience the world. By delivering sustainable, human-centric digital solutions that prepare businesses for the future, we empower brands to leapfrog the competition and surpass best practices. Our 6,000-strong team in 24 countries crafts intelligent, personalized experiences that blend crafts, categories and cultures. At the intersection of data, AI, creativity and technology, we touch lives, grow businesses and unlock value in a digitally accelerated world. Our clients include the world’s leading brands, such as AXA, Dolby, L’Oréal, LVMH, Mars, Mercedes, P&G, Santander, Toyota and Volkswagen. See our work at Valtech.com.