Existing solutions aren't specific enough right? This new tech was trying to improve specificity by targeting the conductivity of the specific nitrate/phosphate and K ions using nanostructures.

I worked in agriculture sensors for years and every time I see articles like this I chuckle a little. They make it sound so easy.

It mentions IoT soil nutrient sensors as if they already exist off the shelf. My company worked on developing one for years that could detect NPK, and it's such a niche technology, incredibly expensive to manufacture, and not very accurate yet. We're probably at least 10-20yrs out from having a reasonably cost highly accurate sensor.

As far as sensor arrays go, it's just not economic. Imagine having to cover 100 acres of fields in sensors. 1000 acres. One sensor per acre isn't enough for precision. At that scale you're looking at tens of thousands of sensors, for a medium sized farm. That's potentially six figures of investment, plus a monthly fee for the software. Most farms aren't going to put down that kind of money in one go, so companies that are offering IoT solutions are going to get a trial run in one small section. It will take many seasons until they even get access to a substantial portion of land. The sales cycle is slow. Most startups can't wait that long and will go out of business.

Remote sensing via satellite will always be more economical than physical sensors and I think the industry will continue to move in that direction.