Norbert Beaujot

Beaujot sprang into action, pioneering the world’s first active hydraulic, ground-following, individual row opener, which minimized soil disturbance by seeding directly into the previous year’s stubble. It was the first of many breakthroughs to come over the next several decades. 

“We’ve spent the past 30-plus years perfecting the art of no-till seeding, whether it’s metering, putting it in the ground or the placement of fertilizer,” Beaujot says. “We’ve focused completely on seeding, and when you’re that focused, you’re either in the wrong business or you should become the best at it.” 

The Early Days

Beaujot launched Seed Hawk with his brother, Patrick, in 1992, after building and testing the first active hydraulic opener prototype. 

“I don’t think there was ever a doubt in my mind that I would make the opener commercially available,” Beaujot recalls. “We moved fast. Once I had workable paper drawings, I got a hold of my friend, Brian Kent, to help build it. Within a few months, we built the first one and planted the first 1,200 acres on our farm right out of the box.

“Prior to that, cultivator and disc type units had a very coarse adjustment for depth. We went to a very long arm with the gauge wheel at the back that acts as the packer wheel, and that long arm gave us very precise seed depth on an individual row basis. With the use of hydraulics, we were able to get the same force against the soil with each packer wheel.” 

Patrick handled the marketing side of the business while Norbert focused on design and manufacturing. They sold directly to farmers in the early days, which meant a lot of time spent on the road at farm shows. 

“The first one we went to was Canada’s Farm Show in Regina,” Beaujot recalls. “Some farmers stumbled upon us and liked what we were doing. Others walked by and said, ‘I’ll never farm that way.’ You have to accept the good and the bad.”

They sold 6 machines that first year in Saskatchewan and Alberta. Soon after that, they were selling over 70 machines per year. That’s when dealers came calling.

“At the beginning, the mainline dealers in particular came to us,” Beaujot says. “They recognized we were taking over the market. One dealer owner said to me, ‘If I wanted to stay in the seeding business, I either had to get out of the seeding business or take you on as a supplier.’ The dealers recognized the value of our product, and I think that’s the same story many other innovators could tell.” 

From Seed Hawk to SeedMaster

The Beaujot brothers went their separate ways when Norbert launched SeedMaster in 2002. Beaujot was 55 years old with enough money to retire, but he had too much left in the tank to hang it up. He was just getting started. 

“It’s kind of like building your second house; as soon as you’ve finished your first one, you’ve got plenty of ideas of how you want to build your second one,” Beaujot says. “I did a big update on the opener itself. Once you’re in a manufacturing facility, you kind of get into a rut and sometimes it’s nice to get a fresh start.” 

Armed with his original patents, SeedMaster quickly became Beaujot’s second successful company. He gives a lot of credit to his family for making SeedMaster what it is today.    

Norbert Beaujot's first big innovation came in 1991 when he developed an active hydraulic, ground-following opener, which minimized soil disturbance by seeding directly into the previous year’s stubble. Source: SeedMaster

“My children at the time were either between jobs or had just graduated from college,” Beaujot says. “They all joined the company. SeedMaster became completely family owned, and the family has been at the core of our decision making.” 

Beaujot’s experience in the business was also a huge asset in the early days of SeedMaster. Younger people are sometimes worried about failure and how others perceive them, whereas a 55-year-old doesn’t stress about that as much, he says.

“Part of that experience is just not letting what other people think bother you,” Beaujot says. “Just like that first farm show when some farmers walked by our booth and said, ‘It’ll be a cold day in hell before I farm this way.’ Those farmers all farm this way now, so it must be a cold day in hell.” 

Top 3 Innovations

Reflecting on 30-plus years in the industry, Beaujot says his top 3 innovations are the Seed Hawk/SeedMaster opener, individual and bulk metering systems and the creation of the autonomous DOT Power Platform in 2017. 

“The opener is definitely what made us what we are today at SeedMaster,” Beaujot says. “With the opener design, if you look at most other no-till seeder manufacturers, they all use part of the technology that came out of our unit 25 years ago.”

DOT Technology Corp., Beaujot's third successful company, was eventually acquired by Raven in 2020. Beaujot made sure his engineers weren’t afraid to fail when they first started working on the autonomous Power Platform. That made all the difference in the world, he says. 

“Back in 2017, when we decided to put our first DOT unit out for exhibit, I went to 3 engineers and said to them, ‘I want to develop a sprayer, a land roller and a grain cart for this unit. You don’t have to win at it, just give it your best shot and if it doesn’t work then we won’t show it.’ We gained a lot by those 3 engineers accepting the chance of failure. If you give something to an engineer and they’re desperate not to fail, that development might take 5 times longer than it would if you told them it’s OK to fail.”

Beaujot will tell his eventual successor to not shy away from failure, always put the customer first and be aware of the banker because at the end of the day a manufacturer must make money to survive. He’s bullish about the impact SeedMaster and fellow shortliners will continue to have on the industry.

“There will always be an opportunity to develop a new product,” he says. “Shortline manufacturers all have a good answer for their local market. They end up with something that’s better for the local market and eventually they recognize they can make it better for a bigger market.”