Technology should make lives, experiences, decisions and success simpler. Our devices, as an example, are all about convergence, where you can make calls, send emails, plan a wedding and get to the next level of Farmville with the same thumb. Twitter pulls together a million different sources of global content and pops them into 140 characters. Facebook aggregates the intricate human relationships between the people we know and presents them to us in a way we can flick through while waiting for a traffic light to change. Our world runs on information, delivered exactly how we like it and in such a way that we can deal with it.
The world of agriculture is no different. The complexity of the industry is intimidating, as is the amount of information required to survive in it: weather, pests and disease, soil texture, soil moisture, seasonal variation, irrigation and even satellites and drones. These being a few of the streams of data farmers need daily just to make sure they can produce a solid yield each season. In fact, farmers are about as reliant on real-time, accurate data as stockbrokers are. Thankfully, there are a multitude of service providers out there who, through paid applications and tools, can feed all this information directly through to the laptop of the farmers.
This is exactly where the problem lies…
Information is vitalising: data-noise is deadly
Since most of this specialised information comes from single-serving providers, who use their own systems to disseminate it, farmers are drowning in data – these aren’t streams of data, they are torrents. The importing, assembling, reading, referencing and translating of these hundreds of disparate bytes of information means that many farmers using these services, on average, spend 1 working day a week in their offices, instead of being in the fields, putting the information to use. All of the data-noise that is created means that, even if there is a particularly critical piece of intelligence, there is a huge chance the farmer will miss it, being (as it were) buried in the ocean of other, less relevant and critical data. Essentially, it is like trying to spot a particular blade of grass in a pasture, where every blade is yelling at you.
MySmart.Farm: machine information, now for humans
Olive and wine farmer, and entrepreneur, Wolfgang von Loeper, decided to take technology away from farmers by creating MySmart.Farm, a content aggregator that pulls farm-critical content automatically from a wide variety of different, independent sources and delivers them through one portal, simplifying information, ensuring that technology speeds up and facilitates smart decisions, rather than getting in the way of them. It gives farmers the information they need, in the way they want it and lets them get back to the business of farming.
Farmers can, through MySmart.Farm, now get access to their own ‘live’ satellite and climate data, while creating forecasts for precise irrigation planning. The accuracy of disease, pest, system modelling are dramatically increased, while dedicated weather prediction, GIS maps and warning systems make sure they are informed and protected. And all of this from one, consistent portal – on a tablet, laptop or smartphone. It truly is, as they claim, ‘greenfingertip intelligence’.
The LaunchLab was first introduced to MySmart.Farm at a the 2014 CleanTech Innovation Programme for SMEs, where Wolfgang’s early iteration was a finalist. At the encouragement of Pierre van Aswegen, who, as a LaunchLab mentor, became their business mentor, Wolfgang moved his base of operations into the LaunchLab space, and MySmart.Farm has grown exponentially since then.
The benefits of a communal, mixed-use space like LaunchLab are not always self-evident, so we’ll list the ones that Wolfgang found the most valuable:
- Networking: Three contracts with large farming and corporate organisations are in the final stages of negotiation due to the connections made at LaunchLab;
- Contact with the University: The strong research ties with the University have seen a new product range being released just recently. MySmart.Farm will also drive a host of other research projects together with Stellenbosch University to attain better decision metrics for its farming clients;
- Credibility: Being associated with both LaunchLab and the University shows the world that this is more than just an idea.
“Tis but a seed”
A content aggregator – while crucial to farmers – is just the beginning. MySmart.Farm is as ambitious as a platform can be, and has solid plans for the future, some of which are already in operation.
Since it first went live, the team have been adding new sources of information, believing that (as long as it’s presented in the right way) you cannot know too much. This ever-growing database, combined with spatial pattern recognition from satellites, and custom algorithms designed to interpret them, will further help to speed up the decision-making process for farmers across the country.
The data itself is also incredibly valuable. Wolfgang and his team will be using the Gigabytes of information that flows through their system daily to create new data sets and actionable metrics for farmer. Smarter information will be fed into the University’s masters students and theses, increasing the accuracy of the students and the value of their research, while also making new information available for commercialisation purposes. Three other LaunchLab startups have decided to join forces with MySmart.Farm, to help build additional digital and credit tools that will further bolster the offering. Machine learning, image recognition and artificial intelligence will take farms to the next level, AI-Farming. All of this is currently being built as the next version of MySmart.Farm.
The roads that modern, scientific farming will travel from here will be decided in the present, with MySmart.Farm firmly behind the wheel: maximising the value of real-time information, delivered through the right vehicle.
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