Steve Nelson, CEO of Plant Sciences Genetics, talks to Fruitnet about the company’s expansion, new raspberry varieties launching in 2026, global market expansion and the company’s shift toward gene editing technology to meet evolving grower and consumer demands
Can you offer some background on Plant Sciences Genetics and its operations?
Steve Nelson: Plant Sciences Europe functions to serve the EMEA regions for its parent company Plant Sciences Genetics Inc based in California, a three-generation family business founded in 1985 by Richard Nelson.
Our business in EMEA has quadrupled in the past nine years via the commercialisation and sales of key berry varieties that are propagated and distributed via our strategic partners throughout the region – El Pinar, Greenery, Sur Export, and SanLucar.
What are the varieties you are best known for?
SN: Plant Sciences Genetics maintains significant growth for each of our geographical and client focused breeding programmes. Plant Sciences Genetics is less known than the berry lines that it has bred and owns. Our strawberry varieties include Inspire, Victory, and Arabella; and our raspberry varieties such as Majestic and Nobility, are in high demand with fruit growers and retailers alike.
What new products are you releasing?
SN: In EMEA, we are currently commercialising two new raspberry varieties that will have limited distribution in Europe (Spain, Portugal, Poland and Italy) and Africa in 2026. One is an early primocane with great flavour and excellent shelf-life suited for winter production as a June/July planting. The other is suitable for double cropping with a green long cane that has high yield and good flavour.
Are there any new international markets that are of interest?
SN: In 2025, Plant Sciences Genetics is truly thinking globally. Beyond our traditional markets, we have expanded sales and strategic partnerships in new production regions like South Korea, China, Central America, and Canada. Through the consolidation of our 17-plus global breeding programmes under the umbrella Plant Sciences Genetics, we are focused on a new open-market sales model in the United States, which is a strategic shift from our historic, predominantly closed/club model for many years.
Within Europe, we are excited about the new opportunity for our raspberries, particularly in southern Europe and Morocco. We will be going to market with our two new varieties in a new way, opening the door for a semi-exclusive group of growers. We believe our varieties are well suited to meet growers and consumers’ needs in balance traits across yield, flavour and shelf-life.
What impact does the uncertain economic and geopolitical climate have on a business like Plant Sciences Genetics?
SN: As a global genetics company, we continually strive to meet the changing needs of growers, consumer expectations, and the regulatory landscape by attempting to breed varieties that optimise economic viability, environmental sustainability, labour savings or efficiencies and/or disease resistance while understanding and navigating nuances from country to country.
Understanding that there is a measure of trade-offs with respect to breeding priorities, we invest in research and innovation partnerships that help us get there efficiently. We attempt to anticipate shifts in the category, market trends, and grower needs whether that’s pursuing new consumer traits, higher yields, agronomic efficiency allowing for reduced fertiliser and water inputs per kilo and/or ensuring new varieties are well suited for new production systems and practices.
What do your customers, whether that’s growers, consumers or retailers, demand from your products? What are the key traits they are looking for?
SN: Balancing the needs of growers, retailers, and consumers is the art and science of every breeder. Every year, we advance selections that strive to ensure grower profitability via yield, harvest efficiency, and disease resistance by commercialising varieties that are agronomically better than those we already have in market.
Meanwhile, we have a relentless focus on consumer and retail driven traits, predominately flavour, appearance, and shelf-life. We strive for higher brix or sugar-to-acid ratios, improved shelf-life, and great looking fruit knowing consumers shop first with their eyes but return to purchase based on the eating experience.
For instance, we launched a new blackberry that has great yield, great flavour, and a very low reversion incidence, so it consistently looks better than the competition while also tasting great and ensuring high grower returns.
What are your aims for the rest of 2025?
SN: We continue to make gains with our technology partners to create the next generation of berries via gene editing to enable new innovations never seen before in the global berry industry.
In the US, we will be commercialising a year-round version of Inspire and a seedless blackberry in the next couple years. While gene edited berries are not yet permitted in Europe, we see extremely high demand for these innovations in the Americas as they solve unmet needs with berry consumers and growers alike. While traditional breeding will always be the heart of what we do, we see technology playing a critical role in solving some of our industries’ biggest challenges from disease resistance to consumer preferences.
While we are a global berry breeding and propagation company with exciting growth goals, our team in Europe is intrinsically enthusiastic about its role in the screening and commercialisation of new varieties in EMEA. We value the role that our European partners play in selecting, commercialising, and growing demand for our genetics. We remain grateful for our partners and licensed growers throughout EMEA and are enthusiastic about the opportunities before us.
