My family has been in the John Deere business since 1955 and we know that our success is directly tied to our customer's success. We are not in the business of scaring our customers into a hasty decision to boost our sales.

Here is the real story.

Currently, as a John Deere dealer, I have the ability to order what Deere calls and upgrade activations in their ordering system. These upgrade comars allow me to move activations from older ITC receivers to newer SF3000 and SF6000 hardware. May 31st 2018 will be the last day that I will have the ability to order these upgrade activations. This is the only thing that is changing for the ITC receivers.

They will continue to work just like they have been. John Deere is not turning these receiver off. John Deere is not making these units inoperable. John Deere is not forcing customers to upgrade to newer hardware.

Lets work through a few scenarios to see if we can hash out some more clarity.

Example #1

A customer has an ITC receiver that is activated at RTK. The customer has $7500 of software tied to this unit. Currently we are still able to move this software to newer hardware so that the customer retains the full value of what he has already paid for. After May 31st, this $7500 will be locked to his current serial number and he will have equipment that will be harder to sell simply because it is older equipment and will not be able to be worked on if it breaks. This results in a loss of value due to the lack of demand for these older receivers.

There is also a significant performance increase when moving to newer hardware. Both the SF6000 and SF3000 have a better driving performance due to a redesigned TCM. They also have longer RTK extend time than the ITC receiver. This benefits the customer in more uptime when RTK coverage is interrupted.

Example #2

A customer has an ITC receiver that is activated at SF2. The customer has $4000 of software tied to this unit. Currently we are still able to move this software to newer hardware so that the customer retains the full value of what he has already paid for. After May 31st, this $4000 will be locked to his current serial number and he will have equipment that will be harder to sell simply because it is older equipment and will not be able to be worked on if it breaks. This results in a loss of value due to the lack of demand for these older receivers.

There is also a significant performance increase when moving to newer hardware. Both the SF6000 and SF3000 have a better driving performance due to a redesigned TCM. They also have longer RTK extend time than the ITC receiver. This benefits the customer in more uptime when RTK coverage is interrupted.

Example #3

A customer has an ITC receiver that is activated at SF1. The customer has no additional value tied to this receiver so he is not at risk of loosing his software value since he has none.

The customers in example 1 and 2 who have additional software value currently attached to their ITC receivers, have a few options.

1. They can choose to do nothing. Their receivers will continue to work like they have been. Units similar to this RTK receiver have sold at auction recently for around $4000.
2. They can choose to upgrade to a SF6000. This option cost $4600 and the retail value of their receiver will be $12,800.
3. They can choose to upgrade to a SF3000 Reman unit. This option will cost $3750 and the retail value of a this receiver will be $9800.

Also remember as well as retaining the value of the activations the customer will also be getting into newer better equipment. The are several advantages between SF6000/SF3000 and older ITC receivers.

1. Improved TCM performance. This means the system compensates for changes in terrain conditions better. This results in better driving performance.
2. Longer RTK extend time. RTK corrections require an "line-of-sight" connection to the base station to work properly. John Deere's receivers have a mode called RTK extend that allows the receiver to continue to function when this "line-of-sight" connection is interrupted either by obstructions in the field or a problem with the base station. ITC receivers have an RTK extend limit of 5 minutes when RTK signal is lost. SF3000 receivers have an increased RTK extend limit of 15 mins. The new SF6000 have an RTK extend time of 14 days.

I hope that this clears up any misconceptions about Deere "forcing" customers to do anything they don't want to do. If you have any questions feel free to reach out to me by using the contact link at the top of the page. I would love to talk to you one on one.