E/ME 105 Final Report

Mini Combine Grain Harvester

Gerardo Morabito
Sonal Gupta
Abin Denny Alexander
Vivek Sam John

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
INDEX

Page

1. Executive Summary 3
2. Problem Statement 3
3. Mission Statement .. 4
4. Market Research 4
a. Target market
b. Primary
c. Secondary
5. Product Development ..7
a. Overall Design Concept
b. Architectural Layout
c. Design Specifications
d. Design Factors
6. Business Plan and Financials ..15
a. Cost Analysis and Pricing
b. Sensitivity Analysis
7.

Company Culture19
a. Key People and Stakeholders
b. Ethical Plan

8.

Appendix..20
a. Major Challenges Overcome and Future Directions
b. Final Team Evaluation G

9.

References24

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Executive Summary
Kerala Agro Corp, a company based in Kerala India, has as its goal to provide small rice paddy
owners a third option over resorting to manual labor to harvest their rice, and over renting a full-scale
combine harvester. Kerala Agro Corp offers to small Keralite farmers the opportunity to purchase a
miniature-sized combine harvester, about a tenth of the cost of a typical full-scale combine. While
manual labor is expensive and becoming increasingly difficult to rely on due to shortages in the amount
of Indians willing to work on the fields, renting a full-scale combine is often much more than required to
harvest lands of a few acres. Our product is essentially the middle ground between these two extremes.
It is our goal that our product will allow small rice paddy to spend even less than they would harvesting
their crops with rented harvesters, by using our cheap, and easy to maintain mini-combine. However,
this is not an easy task, because renting a full-feature combine harvester is surprisingly cheap. We have
dedicated a lot of work to designing not only our harvester, but also the appropriate business and
financial models that would allow us to provide small rice paddy owners in Kerala with a beneficial
product, while allowing Kerala Agro Corp to start up, grow, and become a successful company.

Problem Statement
The intricate steps involved in planting, cultivating, harvesting, and preparing rice requires an
immense labor force. However, recently Kerala has seen a shortage of skilled labor available for
agriculture. Due to high literacy rate and an urbanized life style, a majority of the younger generation
Keralites have migrated to Middle East & other countries in search of better jobs. The laborious nature
of work, low-wage structure, low self esteem and lack of social status are some of the other reasons
that lead to occupational mobility of the paddy field laborers to other lucrative fields. Because of this
shortage the farmers have transitioned to using combine harvesters. These harvesters are available for
purchase but because of their high costs, they are not affordable. However, agriculture groups make
these available for rent on an hourly basis. But the small holding farm owners generally do not require
the full-featured combine harvesters. Also, these combine harvesters are not available in all parts of
rural Kerala due to financial or transportation reasons. Thus, there is a need for a smaller and efficient
combine harvester which would be more accessible and also considerably cheaper.

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Mission Statement
Our mission is to create a portable, user-friendly and low cost mini combine harvester. Our
harvester would not only perform reaping, binding and threshing of crops but it would also collect
harvested grains in sacks and include an optional add-on hot air blower for rainy season harvesting
unlike any full featured combine harvester. It would be available for purchase or for rent to individual
paddy cultivators. Our mini-combine harvester would be manufactured using locally available spare
parts and thus, would be easily maintainable. To make our product reliable, we aim to make the service
life of our product be at least six years. Customers would be able to place an order for our product
online, through the phone, through local mechanics or by walk-in at our factory.

Target Market
Our target market includes both male and female small rice paddy cultivators with land holdings
of one or less acres, to about ten acres, in the state of Kerala, India. Our mini-combine harvesters
would be available for both purchasing and renting. Eventually, we do plan to branch out to other
agriculture centered states of Punjab, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh etc.
For purchase
Areas with no access to renting full featured harvesters and where manual labor is not easily
available.
For renting
Small farms that do not need the complete harvesting capacity of full featured harvester to collect
their crops. These would rent our product on per hour basis.
Larger farms that would prefer renting our harvester on per day basis.
In areas with no access to renting a full featured combine harvester with a shortage of labor.
We based our target market mostly on our primary research. But, we did take into account our
secondary research to determine our market for renting.

Primary Market Research

For our primary research we mostly interviewed paddy field owners in the state of Kerala, India.
We also interviewed an agricultural officer who helped us decide the farmers to talk to and also
gave us suggestions on design specifications based on the local demands. Our main purpose was to
determine problems with the existing harvester to facilitate a better design for our product. Also,
we made sure to inquire about features that they would like our mini combine to include which are
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part of the existing full scale combine harvesters. Some of the issues with the existing harvesters
are:

Makes a lot of noise.

Does not preserve the straw from the crop well.

No easy way to transfer crop from harvester to collection site. The harvester has to leave
the field to do so and thus have to pay for an extra hour.

Very large and cumbersome to transport.

Has no way to keep the rice grain dry during or after rains.

Some of the features that most farmers asked to be included in our product are:
Wheels or treads for mobility
Hot Air Blower
Grain Collection Sacks
English and Local Language instruction manual

Secondary Market Research

Most of our secondary research included analyzing our competition: Full featured combine
harvesters and Manual labor. We also looked at existing mini-combine harvesters which are currently
being manufactured and sold in China and United States.
We looked at different models of Full featured combine harvesters being sold both in China and India.
Based on the combines we examined, we determined that the average working efficiency of full
featured combine harvesters in (Hectare/Hour => Ha/h) is about .206 ~ .476 Ha/H which is equivalent to
half to one acre per hour. (.509 - 1.17 acres/hour). On an average full featured combine harvesters
harvest 0.83 acres of land in an hour.
Cost Analysis:

HARVESTING COST (for one acre land ~ 4047 meter sq)

Labor Intensive:
1 male worker Rs. 500 / day
1 female worker Rs. 350 / day
One acre harvesting (for a day): 30 workers: 25 females + 5 males
Total Harvesting Cost= Rs. 11250 ~ $ 225
Annual Harvesting Cost = Rs. 22500 ~ $ 450
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Capital Intensive (using a full featured combine harvester)

The full sized combine harvester takes about two hours to harvest one acre land. This includes the time
spent for driving the harvester back and forth between the field and the storage unit.
Rent charges = Rs. 1200Rs. 2000 ~ $24-$40 (per hour)
(Government charges - Rs 1200/ Hr and,
Private companies charge below Rs 2000/Hr)

Average Rent = Rs. 1600 ~ $ 32

Cost to harvest one acre land = ~$64
Annual cost = $64 * 2 = $128 (for one acre land which takes about 2 hours.)

Then, we analyzed our product based on the existing mini combines being sold in China and the US.
Based on the working efficiency data from all the above we get that the average efficiency for a minicombine harvester is .073 - .189 Ha/h. Thus, on an average a mini-combine harvests .37 acres in an hour.
Because, we are including sacks for storing we can assume that we would take maximum 15 min to store
the grains. This implies that it would take us about 3 hours to harvest 1 acre of land with our harvester
which is only an hour slower than the full featured combine harvesters.
Thus, we have decided to make our harvester available for rent for $16 - $20 for an hour. We will also
give our customers the option of renting our harvester on a per day basis for about $80 which basically
accounts for 5 hours of harvesting. On a typical day, a farmer can harvest for up to 8 hours. Renting a
full featured combine harvester would cost 32 (per hour cost) * 8 $ ~ 256$. This would harvest around 4
acres. Our harvester for two days would cost around 160$, almost 100$ cheaper than the full featured
harvester and would easily harvest the 4 acres.
Harvesting time for Rabi rice lasts from March - June and for Kharif rice from November - February.
Thus, assuming that in each season our harvester would be rented out for at least 30 days, in a year our
harvester would be rented out for 60 days. And considering the service life of our product of 6 years, we
can estimate total revenue from each harvester to be 80 * 60 * 6 = $28800. Including the maintenance
cost, our product would still be profitable and this would also give our product a bigger market.

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Product Development
Overall Design Concept
Our mini-combine harvester is made up five main components:
Reaping: The assembly of components
Threshing: The rotor which forces the rice grain out of the rice crop
Collecting: The pans used to filter the grain, and the storage sacks where it is placed.
Mobility: The wheels, axle, differential, and all other parts needed to allow our product
to move and maneuver.
Power: The engine, transmission, and all other parts needed to power the previous four
components.
When designing our product, our team came up with several potential solutions to solve these
different problems. In order to tailor our product specifically to the demands of our market segment,
we placed heavy emphasis on addressing the concerns of our customers determined from our market
research. Essentially, in designing our harvester, our goal was to determine solutions to the problems in
existing harvesters being sold on the market. These problems were already listed, but are shown here
again for quick reference:
1. Current harvesters are too noisy, making them annoying to operate.
2. They do not preserve the straw from the crop well.
3. They do not offer an easy way to transfer crop from harvester to collection site. The
harvester has to leave the field to do so.
4. They are very large and cumbersome to transport.
5. They have no way to keep the rice grain dry during rainy days.
From the different interviews that we carried out in Kerala, we concluded that our design should
address these issues in order to differentiate itself from the products offered by our competitors.
Problems 1 and 4 are dealt with by the fact that our harvester will be much smaller than current
harvesters being rented out in Kerala. Compared to existing harvesters, our harvester will be about a
fifth of their size, and a twelfth of their weight, making it considerably easier to transport. Because of its
smaller size, our harvester will require a less powerful engine, reducing the noise output from the power
component. More exact dimensions of our harvester and of existing harvester will be provided later in
this section.
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Problem 3 is dealt with by the decision to include replaceable storage sacks for the collection
component of our harvester. These sacks can be removed once they are filled, and taken to the rice
collection site off the rice paddy. This allows for the harvester to continue operating without having to
travel off and on the field.
finally, problem 5 is addressed by including a hot air blower into the collection component to
keep the harvested dry. This feature will be optional for our customers. In order to deal with problem
2, we chose to include a conventional thresher design into our harvester. There are two types of
thresher designs, rotary and conventional. The rotary design depends on a much larger threshing drum,
and separates the rice from the chaff by centrifugal force, accomplished by rotating really fast [3]. The
conventional design depends on gravity, forcing the plant against threshing rasps to separate the grains.
Besides preserving the rest of the plant (the rotary design pulverizes it), the conventional design
requires less power, meaning that our harvester will require a less powerful engine. Going back to
problem 1, this will mean that our harvester will be even less noisier from implementing a conventional
thresher design. For these reasons we opted for the conventional design.
The following diagram illustrates the typical layout of the components in a combine harvester:

Figure 1: Conceptual diagram of a combine harvester. Sections 1 is the rice crop. Sections 2, 3,
and 4, represent the reaping component. Section 5 represents the threshing component.
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Sections 6, 7 and 8 are the storage component. Section 9 is the ejected leftover chaff generally
used for making hay.
Due to the complex nature of our product, and the numerous components which would have to
be designed to have a working combine harvester, we decided to focus on the reaper subsystem.
Therefore the design section for our project will primarily deal with the reaper component.
Architectural Layout
The design adopted for our reaper component is mostly based on existing designs. The reaper assembly
has remained unchanged for the past few decades. Because of this, our design only differs from current
designs in that all of the parts of entire apparatus have been reduced in size, and that a few parts of
been taken out to reduce costs. Before explaining these changes, we will provide an explanation of all
the sub-systems that compose our reaper, and of the overall architectural layout of its parts. The
subsystems our reaper is composed of are:
Front Rotating Auger: Conveys the cut grain from the cutter bar into the feeder housing. This is
located past the cutter bar.
Cutter Bar: Made up of the knife sections and hold-down clips. The cutter bar is positioned along the
front part of the bulldozer.
Knife Sections: Blades used to cut the rice crop.
Hold-down Clips: Keeps the knife sections connected to the cutter bar at the appropriate shearing
angle.
Reel: Assembly of bars that spins to push the crop against the cutter bar. It is held up by the reel
support arm
Reel Support Arm: Controls the positioning of the reel. It is attached to the bulldozer
Spring Tines: Attached to the reel bars to push the rice crop towards the cutter bar.
Bulldozer: Contains the entire reaper system. It is mounted on the combine harvester body.
Feeder housing tube: Connects reaper to thresher, where grain is stored prior to being threshed. The
feeder housing tube will receive the cut grain from the front rotating auger.
The following diagram illustrates how they function together. Detailed sketches including the
dimensions of these components are included in the appendix.

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The overall architecture of our reaper is designed to be bus-modular. The reaper itself is made up of
different sections, each with a specific function. These functions have to be carried out in order,
namely, pulling the rice plant close to the cutter bar, cutting the plant, and pushing it towards the feeder
housing tube. The components are arranged so that this process is carried out in that order.
We have also adopted a few changes involving the reduction of required parts, in order to decrease
the overall cost of our product. These changes are:

Increasing the spacing between the spring tines in the reel

o

Typical harvesters have about 12 tines per meter of cutter bar [1].

Our harvester has 8 tines per meter of cutter bar.

Reducing the number of cutter sections in the cutter bar from 8 per meter, to 6 per meter [1].

Reducing the number of hold-down clips based on the reduction of cutter bar sections (one holddown clip per cutter section).

Reducing the number of reel bars from 4 to 3.

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These changes reduce the amount of material required to manufacture our harvester. In particular,
the cutter sections and hold-down clips (illustrated in our sketches of the device), are a bit costly. By
implementing these changes, our final product requires 12 tines less, 6 cutter sections less, and 6 less
hold-down clips. At the same time, these changes would, in theory, have very little effect on the
performance of our harvester. Still, this remains to be tested.
Based on our bill of materials (included in the appendix), these changes reduce the
manufacturing cost of our harvester by about $150. These changes lead our reaper to cost $590 rather
than $740. However, other than these modifications, and the scaling down of the dimensions, our
reaper design is very similar to the one incorporated into our competitors harvesters.
The scaling down of our harvester, and therefore our reaper, is the main reason for why our
product will be so much cheaper than existing harvesters. A typical combine harvester is 7m to 12 m
long, and 3m to 5m wide. Our combine harvester will be 3.6 m long, and 1.6 m wide. The reaper
section will be 1.6 m wide, and 0.8 m long. For larger harvesters, this section is the as wide as the width
of the reaper (3m to 5m), and about 1m to 2m long (depending on the size of the harvester). The height
of the cutter bar can be raised about 1 m high off the ground for large harvesters. We feel that this
feature is not necessary for our harvester, and hence have reduced the elevation adjustment provided
by the bulldozer section to at most 0.35 m.
The following two images can serve as a reference to compare the typical sizes of mini-combines
to full-size combines:

Figure 2: This is a CAGRI model mini-combine harvester manufactured in Jiangsu, China. The
blue seat in the back is the chair for the operator. The harvester is 3.8 m long by 1.6 m wide
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Figure 3: Full-scale combine harvester Kartar-4000 sold by Kartar, a company based in

Punjab, India. Compare the operator seat (black chair), to the one in the mini combine.
The harvester measures 8.0 m long by 4.1 m wide.

Design Specifications
The following is a table of the design specifications for our combine harvester:
Dimensions and Performance:

Length:
Width:
Height:
Weight:
Max Speed:
Storage Sack Capacity:
Max Harvesting Rate:
Working Efficiency:

3.60 m
1.60 m
1.50 m
570 kg
1.5 m/s
0.070 m^3 (40 kg of rice)
0.49 acres/hour
2.15 3.17 acres /per day (8 hours)

Power:

Engine Power:
Fuel Consumption:
Fuel Tank Capacity:

9hp, 6.6kW
40 kg per hour / ~53 liters per hour
60 liters
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Reaper:

Cutter Bar Width:

1.50 m

Cutter Sections Specifications:

Number in Cutter bar: 9

Width: 0.15m +/- 1.0mm
Length: 0.20m
Max Elevation Change: 0.25 m
Number of Reel Bars: 4
Reel bar length: 1.55 m
Spring Tines per bar: 8

Reel Specifications:

Figure 4: Combine harvester reaper

Thresher:

Thresher Type:

Conventional Design

Thresher Drum:

Diameter: 0.10m
Length: 0.15m
Speed: 450 rpm
0.36 kg/s

Thresher Feeding Rate (amount of grain fed

into thresher from reaper):

Design Factors
In this section we discuss what considerations drove the design of our harvester. The reasons for each
of our design decisions are summarized by the following list (some of these only apply to our reaper
since most of our designed focus on the reaper for our harvester):
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Our product is designed for low cost: The size of our product is the main determinant of its cost;
therefore we designed our harvester to be as small as possible. At the same time, we removed
components from the design that had little to no effect on the performance (harvesting rate) of our
harvester.
Our product is designed for good performance: When coming up with the specifications of our product
we ensured that the harvesting rate of our harvester would be high enough to make it useful for our
target market (lands of up to ten acres). Our average efficiency harvesting rate of 2.66 acres per day will
be more than enough for our customers.
Our product is designed to be safe for the user: The operator of our harvester seats on the back, away
from any dangerous parts (the rotating reel in the front, and the thresher which is within the vehicle
chassis). While the user will be in no danger, he or she will have to receive a demonstration on how to
operate the harvester safely. We expect that our customers will not attempt to drive the harvester into
anyone.
Our product is designed to be reliable: The design implemented into our product is essentially the
same that has been used in harvesters for the past few decades. The threshing method has remained
unchanged for centuries, except in this case it is mechanized. Because of all of this, we are confident
that our product will be reliable and perform as expected.
Our product is designed to be durable: Our product will last at the very least, six years. The better it is
taken care of, the longer it will last. The cutter sections in the reaper can be easily replaced by a local
mechanic as they wear out, just like the spring tines. As the rasp bars within the thresher wear out,
these can also be replaced. The lifetime of the engine will essentially be the main constraint on how
long our product will last.
Our product is designed to be easy to purchase: Our customers will be given many options over how to
purchase their harvester. They will be able to place an order for our product online, through the phone,
through local mechanics or by walk-in at our factory. This will reduce, or hopefully eliminate the
number of customers that we lose due to our product being inconvenient and difficult to obtain.
Our reaper is designed for ease of assembly and manufacturing: Our reaper is relatively easy to
manufacture. All of the parts fit into the bulldozer section, with the parts that go deeper into it, being
installed first. Because of our bus-modular architecture, each of the parts can be installed in
progression, starting from the feeder tube, then the front auger, then the reel, and finally the cutter bar.
The cutter sections are screwed at the base of the bulldozer section, and kept in place by the hold-down
clips. The reel itself can be assembled separately, and then installed into the bulldozer section.
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Our reaper is designed for ease of testing: The reaper simply has to be attached to a power source to
spin the reel, and then it has to be moved across a rice paddy. Each of the reaper components can then
be observed and the overall performance of the device can be measured by measuring the amount of
rice crop passed through the front auger into the feeder tube, per second. At full operation, this
amount should be equivalent to our harvesters thresher feeding rate, 0.36 kg/s.
Our reapers architecture was thought through: The placement of all our components is shown in our
schematic and in our sketches.
Our reaper is designed with clear engineering specifications: the design specifications section and our
sketches show all our engineering specifications. These numbers were obtained from carrying out
research and calculations to meet all our other design factors. Our main constraint for determining
these numbers was the size of our harvester, which has a direct effect on its cost.
Finally, our product is designed to address the needs of our customers: Although our design includes
tried and true methods that have been employed in combine harvesters for several years, we took into
account the demands of our customers when designing it. Primarily, we made our harvester less noisy,
cheaper, smaller, easier to transport, and equipped with features that were preferred by our customers
according to our market research. Finally, our harvester was designed to meet the needs of our market
segment, small rice cultivators with lands holdings of less than ten acres. Our harvesting rate allows for
a ten acre farmer to harvest all of his land in four and a half days, and this is assuming that our harvester
is operating at the low-range of its efficiency.

Business Plan and Financials

The success of our product depends heavily on the cost of our product to our customers. Since, our
product is very complex and requires working of three different parts together (the reaper, thresher and
the engine), we decided to further look into partnerships with existing agriculture equipment companies
in Kerala like KAMCO and RaidCo. From the KAMCO website and after having researched more into the
company we have determined that they have had a history of collaborating with other companies and
also outsourcing/ buying different products from different vendors. Collaborating with KAMCO would
significantly reduce the capital costs for us. Even if we assume that we will be establishing another
physical plant for the manufacturing of the mini-combine, the expertise we get through KAMCO would
be indispensible. Since KAMCO has been in the agriculture equipment industry for many years, having
KAMCO members or our team would serve as a great asset. Also, we plan to use KAMCO contacts with
government and agricultural groups to sell our product. The most important factor would be the role
they would play in risk mitigation. We will assume the role of design specifications and product design
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and KAMCO will take over the product manufacturing due to their expertise in the field. They would also
help us network with raw material suppliers around Kerala. The existing KAMCO relationship with these
vendors would help us get the best price on the spare parts and this would further drive our cost down.

Exit Strategy
There are several critical junctures over the course of the next five years, corresponding to key
milestones, where the fate of the company must be determined. The proof of concept milestone,
expected to occur in the first fiscal year will determine whether or not we have a viable company. If
the product development cycle takes too long and too many competitors with similar solutions
enter the market first, we will sell the IP and liquidate the company. If we reach the commercially
viable product milestone and demonstrate a market for our product, but see sales stagnate and fall
significantly short of our FY 2015 revenue target, we will look to be acquired by an existing
agriculture equipment company preferable KAMCO.

Pricing
Pricing our product to make it affordable to the farmers but at the same time making sure that we
account for all our costs is essential. From our primary research we determined that our customers
would be willing to pay $4000 to buy our product. Based on the Profit and Loss Statement given below,
we can see that to be profitable by our second year we need to price our mini-combine harvester at
$3000. Also, since we will provide the option of renting the combine harvester at around $80 per day,
we would be collecting revenue of each unit for about 6 years. This option would be most beneficial to
our customers as can be seen from the analysis in the secondary research. After we become profitable
we plan to introduce in the market, additional products such as tillers, reapers etc and add-ons such as
the hot air blower. Their sale would also bring in additional revenue.
Sensitivity Analysis
We developed a conservative sales and product development scenario to assess Kerala Agro Corps
ability to weather missed revenue targets and delayed product releases and still maintain a positive
balance sheet. We are assuming that it would take us about six months to set up our physical plant and
to finalize design specifications and perform necessary quality checks. Despite these potential setbacks,
the forecast for Kerala Agro Corps fiscal health is still positive. After the initial investment in R&D and
the plant, the vast majority of Kerala Agro Corps expenses are in the salary for the engineers and
laborers delivering products. Hiring can postponed or these services or can be outsourced to
accommodate product launch delays and sluggish sales. The willingness of the founding team to work
for much less than the value of their skill set given their stake in the company along with partnering with
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another established agriculture equipment firm, allows Kerala Agro Corp to grow organically and remain
stable in the face of uncertainty

Statements
START UP
Funding
From Friends, Family and Founders

50

From Partnering Firm

30

Total Funding

80

Requirements
Physical Plant (Equipment)

25

Legal (Patent fees, etc)

Travel

10

Prototyping

Total Start-up Requirements

45

Cash Balance on Start-Date

74

Table 1: Start-up financials illustrating Cash Balance on Start Date in thousands of USD

BILL OF MATERIALS

Component
Cutter Bar:

Material

Assembly Labor

Knife Sections

4.50

4.50

40.50

Hold-down Clips
Reel Assembly

12.70

1.00

13.70

23.30

Spring Tine Pieces

0.40

0.75

1.15

36

41.40

Pickup Reel

75.00

42.00

117.00

117.00

Reel Support Arm

Feeder Tube

15.00

14.00

29.00

29.00

Feeder Feed Plate

20.00

14.00

34.00

34.00

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Unit Variable Cost

Quantity Total

Front Rotating Auger

32.00

7.00

39.00

39.00

Bulldozer Section

50.00

35.00

85.00

85.00

Inner Divider Assembly

18.00

3.50

21.50

43.00

Outer Divider Assembly

15.00

3.50

18.50

37.00

Total

589.20

Since we are renting some of the units we manufacture, their COGS is added only once for the entire
five years however, they generate revenue each year.

Projected Profit and Loss

FY2011
Revenue
Sales (Including Purchase and
Renting)
COGS
Gross Margin
Gross Margin (%)

FY2012

FY2013

FY2014

FY2015

0
0
0

150
70
80
53.3

570
210
360
63.1

1290
390
900
69.8

1590
280
1310
82.4

SGA
Rent, Plant equipment and Utilities
Salaries

28
150

28
200

29
275

29
350

30
560

Travel, Commissions, and Marketing

Office Equipment

10
2

10
2

25
3

30
6

37
6

Accounting, Legal, Benefits and Misc

15

20

23

28

32

R&D
Quality assurance
Insurance

5
23
5

5
27
8

10
28
10

15
28
12

15
32
15

Operating Expenses
Profit Before Interest and Taxes
Estimated Tax

238
-238
-63

300
-150
-75

403
167
-115

498
792
-165

727
863
-180

Net Profit

-301

-225

52

627

683

N/A

Table X: Pro Forma Projected Profit and Loss in thousands of USD

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Company Culture
Kerala Agro Corp culture is a blend of technology entrepreneurship and cutting-edge science.
Team members from SaintGits have a solid business background, while team members from Caltech
are technical researchers. We aim to become a meritocracy that encourages invention, creativity,
and collaborative decision making. Central to the decisions made by the company is the code of
conduct and the honor code, which states that no member of the Kerala Agro Corp community may
take unfair advantage of any other member of the Kerala Agro Corp community. We all promise to
put an equal amount of work into the company and think about the interest of the company prior to
ours.

Key People and the Stakeholders

From the very onset of setting up Kerala Agro Corp, the four team members will assume the
roles of

CTO, CFO, engineer, marketer, and salesman. Due to our collaboration with SaintGits

Institute of Management, we also have members in the team who are familiar with management
and can take care of the financials. And the members of the team from Caltech will assume the role
of tech leads. All members of the team will utilize their connections to make some initial sales.

For guidance, we expect to get all the help we can from Professor Pickar, Michelle, Jason and
Vinay. After the first few sales, we plan to hire a dedicated salesman with experience in the
agriculture equipment market in India. Since, our model is based on partnering with other
agricultural firms like KAMCO and Raidco Kerala Ltd., we also expect to get help from their design
engineers and Board of directors. Based upon the projected profitability of our venture, a decision
to continue operations will be made after the second year of operations. If Kerala Agro Corp is
projected to be profitable, we will bring to the market newer products and example of which is the
hot blower attachment compatible with other combine harvesters.

Stake Holders
1. Paddy farmers i.e. the customers
2. Product Manufacturers that would be Kerala Agro Corp and the partnering company.
3. Private and Government companies.
4. Spare Parts Suppliers
5. Guides: Professor Ken Pickar, Ajith Thomas, Michelle, Jason , and Vinay
6. Team Members: Abin, Vivek, Gerardo, and Sonal and our friends and families.

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Code of Conduct
Honor Code
No member of the Kerala Agro Corp community may take unfair advantage of any other member of
the Kerala Agro Corp community.
1. Kerala Agro Corp members offer services in the areas of their competence and experience,
affording full disclosure of their qualifications.
2. Kerala Agro Corp members are honest, truthful, and fair in presenting information and making
public statements reflecting on professional matters and their professional role.
3. Kerala Agro Corp members engage in professional relationships without bias of race, creed, sex,
age, national origin, or impairment.
4. Kerala Agro Corp members accept responsibilities for their actions.
5. Competition would be dealt with respect. Kerala Agro Corp members would refrain from stealing
proprietary information or trade secrets of any kind.

Appendix
Major Challenges Overcome and Future Directions
Although there still are a lot of issues that need to be addressed for finalizing our plans and
designs for our harvester, let alone releasing it into the market, we feel like a lot has been accomplished
in the past ten weeks. We did realize that our product would be too complex to design completely, so
instead we focused to dedicate ourselves to the design of the reaper. Because of this, we still have to
design the rest of our harvester with the same amount of thought as we did for our reaper. We are glad
that we have managed to turn what at first seemed like a completely unviable idea, making a miniharvester to compete against the very cheap to rent full-scale combines, into a more tangible concept.
Although we are not really satisfied with our interactions with our team mates in India, at least we were
able to work on a project with people thousands of miles away. This will prove to be a very valuable
experience in the future, especially with the amount of globalization currently taking place.

Final Team Evaluation

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Our team experienced technical difficulties right from the onset of the class. We had trouble
communicating through Skype, so we resorted to using gchat for our meetings. However, as the class
progressed our team also started to suffer from communication problems. As a team, we divided the
workload for each of the assignments. However, for many of the homework assignments (particularly in
the latter part of the course), the midterm, and this final, our team members from India turned in
unsatisfactory work, very close to the deadline, giving us (Caltech team members) little opportunity to
ask them to fix it, and forcing us to do most, or all of their assigned parts. It was difficult to work like
this, especially because this class demands a considerable amount of work and research.
Component Sketches (shown in the next two pages)

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References
[1] http://www.indiamart.com/balkarcombines/agricultural-harvester.html
[2] http://www.kartarcombines.com/kartar-combine-harvester.html
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Combine_harvester
Figure 1: http://www.explainthatstuff.com/howcombineharvesterswork.html
Figure 2: http://www.alibaba.com/product-gs/50642587/Mini_Combine_Harvester.html
Figure 3: http://www.kartarcombines.com/kartar-combine-harvester.html
Figure 4: http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-4546018-harvester-thresher.html

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