NEWS
Colin Hurd, who built tractor-kit startup Smart Ag before Raven and CNH bought it and now works on OEM factory integration at Mach, notes investors put at least $2.3B into aftermarket autonomy kits, including $800M for excavator retrofits in the past six months. At Smart Ag, covering one tractor model took five kit variations, and bolt-on kits split warranty and service blame between dealers, OEMs and kit vendors when a 2 a.m. valve swap or firmware update breaks calibration. Hurd sells Tier-1 OEM integration, so that is his lane, but his five fleet-support questions apply to any operator weighing aftermarket autonomy.
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Churchill Capital XI shareholders approved a $2.5B combination with Agility Robotics, which raised $465M and plans to trade on Nasdaq as AGLT starting Thursday. Agility cites Digit deployments at GXO, Toyota and Schaeffler, plus an Agco Hesston pilot next year, toward 100 customers by end of 2027. The US industrial humanoid bet now has a public ticker; watch whether warehouse hours turn into factory hours.
NEWS
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NEWS
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