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Agricultural – fastest growing robotic sector

eetimes.com

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Re: Agricultural – fastest growing robotic sector

#21

Post by Amir6 »

jonathankoren wrote: post #8

I'm life long friends with with family that owns a 80,000 acre grain and soybean farm, and they looked into drones last year or so for crop assessment, but found it wasn't really effective from either an analysis or price perspective. The drones didn't really have the range or endurance to properly sample the fields (we're talking fields of several square miles each), and the resolution of the camera just couldn't gi…

I would like to have a conversation with you or them to convince them otherwise. I have been operating my own ag robotics company for 2 years and have contracts with biggest ag producers in Canada. 80,000 sounded big but not as big as biggest producers of wheat or corn!

Re: Agricultural – fastest growing robotic sector

#22

Post by cylinder »

Amir6 wrote: post #21
jonathankoren wrote: post #8

I'm life long friends with with family that owns a 80,000 acre grain and soybean farm, and they looked into drones last year or so for crop assessment, but found it wasn't really effective from either an analysis or price perspective. The drones didn't really have the range or endurance to properly sample the fields (we're talking fields of several square miles each), and the resolution of the camera just couldn't gi…

I would like to have a conversation with you or them to convince them otherwise. I have been operating my own ag robotics company for 2 years and have contracts with biggest ag producers in Canada. 80,000 sounded big but not as big as biggest producers of wheat or corn!

How did you get into this business? Are there opportunities for small business?

Re: Agricultural – fastest growing robotic sector

#23

Post by infinite8s »

fanquake wrote: post #11
johnloeber wrote: post #10

I'm doing work in venture capital with a specific focus on computer vision. I've looked into the agricultural robotics topic with some scrutiny. Here are some comments: * feasibility of this new technology is due to the commoditization of three necessary components over the last few years: cameras (improved immensely in both quality and cost due to the smartphone revolution), drones/UAVs/small satellites themselves,…

"can capture geospatial data on huge areas much more easily" What are you referring to as a "huge" area? All the work I'm seeing done with drones has been limited to ~700ha/day, if you've got perfect conditions. Normally it's much less. What do you think drones with heat or IR cameras are most applicable too? When we've got machinery mounted sensors such as a biomass/NDVI camera or a weed-seeker, and the machinery ha…

That comment was referring to the use of UAVs or small satellites for broad surveillance (but at a lower resolution).

Re: Agricultural – fastest growing robotic sector

#24

Post by zevets »

terravion wrote: post #7
zevets wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's neat to see - I had always expected large vehicles to dominate the surveillance space. Will you guys go unmanned when, 10 years from now, the FAA lets civilians fly Predator like UAVS? Also, what's your perspective on the commercial smallsat imagery market? I've long been of the view that large UAVs will wipe those guys out.

Yes, someday TerrAvion might go unmanned, but as a former military drone unit commander, I both look forward to the day and think it is further off than people in the Valley think. We've had the technology for unmanned trains for 60 years and yet when all you care about is price per ton/passenger mile, sometimes an operator is the last part of the labor fraction to take out. Mapping is a similar price per pixel type…

I think VCs are scared by the sensible business plan and the larger capital costs. Drones also get a pass from scrutiny as VCs get excited about investing in the platform, which allows VCs to project their 100x dreams.

I would guess your biggest challenge is sales - convincing farmers that they need this. Is this true? Also - out of curiosity, what do you fly?

Re: Agricultural – fastest growing robotic sector

#25

Post by fanquake »

Amir6 wrote: post #21
jonathankoren wrote: post #8

I'm life long friends with with family that owns a 80,000 acre grain and soybean farm, and they looked into drones last year or so for crop assessment, but found it wasn't really effective from either an analysis or price perspective. The drones didn't really have the range or endurance to properly sample the fields (we're talking fields of several square miles each), and the resolution of the camera just couldn't gi…

I would like to have a conversation with you or them to convince them otherwise. I have been operating my own ag robotics company for 2 years and have contracts with biggest ag producers in Canada. 80,000 sounded big but not as big as biggest producers of wheat or corn!

I'd be interested in hearing your arguments/use cases for drones over broad-acre properties, we've got(generally wheat) producers here with properties > 150'000 acres.

Re: Agricultural – fastest growing robotic sector

#26

Post by Amir6 »

fanquake wrote: post #25
Amir6 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would like to have a conversation with you or them to convince them otherwise. I have been operating my own ag robotics company for 2 years and have contracts with biggest ag producers in Canada. 80,000 sounded big but not as big as biggest producers of wheat or corn!

I'd be interested in hearing your arguments/use cases for drones over broad-acre properties, we've got(generally wheat) producers here with properties > 150'000 acres.

shoot an email to "amirbeta" on outlook and we will have a discussion.

Re: Agricultural – fastest growing robotic sector

#27

Post by Amir6 »

cylinder wrote: post #22
Amir6 wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would like to have a conversation with you or them to convince them otherwise. I have been operating my own ag robotics company for 2 years and have contracts with biggest ag producers in Canada. 80,000 sounded big but not as big as biggest producers of wheat or corn!

How did you get into this business? Are there opportunities for small business?

lots of opportunities! let me know if you are interested in having a conversation. My contact info is in above comment.
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