Does FarmLogs work for aquaculture?
FarmLogs
21–30 of 92 posts
Re: FarmLogs
#22I have my doubts about the figure quoted "20% of row crop farms." I wonder how this number was presented / justified with what data at the meeting?
Maybe something like 20% of row crop farms of acreage greater than X where X is fairly large?
Re: FarmLogs
#23> And importantly, they started out doing something that any two programmers could have done. Which is funny because many VCs in SV ask the question (explicitly or implicitly) "is this something two Stanford CS students can do?" If the answer is yes, they move along. I want more FarmLogs stories to exist.
The one counter thing I'll say to this is that Brad and Jessie both had some first hand experience of farming (Full Disclosure: I was in the W12 batch with them and talked to them both a fair amount during YC) They weren't just two software guys with an idea, they also had seen some of the pains firsthand and understood the market well. I think their unique backgrounds lent them to making this the perfect opportunity for them to tackle and ultimately one of the majors reasons they've made such a large impact so quickly.
Re: FarmLogs
#24As an early user of FarmLogs (and as a programmer), I found it really useful. All I wanted to do was find out average rainfall on my land and make a way to denote the prime spots for crop planting on the land (purely as a hobby). It was super useful and intuitive for that, something that I couldn't get to make happen easily trying all sorts of things with Google Maps, various mapping APIs, and Google Earth.
Just curious, did you try ClimateBasic from Monsanto/ClimateCorp and compare some data for "ground truth"?
Re: FarmLogs
#25This is interesting because there must be a small window between all this data just lying around (cf NSA) and most sectors having the data transformed and pipelined into their decision making.
Sam Altman is right - this is the sort of thing that two software devs can pull off - but like everything the door must be closing.
I'm tempted to make a spreadsheet of all the novel data sources I can find (ONS, satellite, travel, weather etc) and plot against SEC codes - I am pretty sure that will allow me to procrastinate long enough for the enthusiasm to wear off.
Re: FarmLogs
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
For anyone who doesn't know FarmLogs has their HQ in Ann Arbor aka 'tree town'
I'd say just as many tree's here as any college town really. PS hi chris.
I think it has to do with the name 'Arbor' [1] than the town itself, which has a fair amount of trees in the older neighborhoods but isn't excessively forested.
[1]: http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_eng...
Re: FarmLogs
#27Damn; I wouldn't have thought farmers would be a good group to target software towards, but it actually makes a lot of sense. Out of curiosity, I wonder how these guys actually manage to get those millions of dollars in savings. Nice to see a new startup is trying and succeeding to make a positive difference for some pretty critical customers :) Going to keep an eye on this group for sure. Something tells me they'll…
>Out of curiosity, I wonder how these guys actually manage to get those millions of dollars in savings.
I'm guessing a big chunk of that figure is derived from a boost in crop yield due to optimal placement. So the bottom line cost for the farmer was similar but money went much further.
Re: FarmLogs
#28> And importantly, they started out doing something that any two programmers could have done. Which is funny because many VCs in SV ask the question (explicitly or implicitly) "is this something two Stanford CS students can do?" If the answer is yes, they move along. I want more FarmLogs stories to exist.
The one counter thing I'll say to this is that Brad and Jessie both had some first hand experience of farming (Full Disclosure: I was in the W12 batch with them and talked to them both a fair amount during YC) They weren't just two software guys with an idea, they also had seen some of the pains firsthand and understood the market well. I think their unique backgrounds lent them to making this the perfect opportunity…
That's a very good point - and despite my earlier comment just knowing where and how much the pain points are matters.
For example in the (UK) building trade there is a booming trade in "builder remediation" - fixing the accidental below spec work they did not notice. It can wipe out much of the profit a builder makes having to go in and pull a wall down.
I keep calling the solution to this as "bringing the factory to the field". That is measurements and control processes we see in the factory applied in less controlled environments. With mobile tech for example one could slap QR stickers on timbers, fittings and hard boards and at each stage of the build require a photo of the materials in-situ before they get covered in plaster or the next layer up.
This would help track an enormous number of issues in the building trade.
I can see how just a little inside knowledge can help.
Re: FarmLogs
#29Damn; I wouldn't have thought farmers would be a good group to target software towards, but it actually makes a lot of sense. Out of curiosity, I wonder how these guys actually manage to get those millions of dollars in savings. Nice to see a new startup is trying and succeeding to make a positive difference for some pretty critical customers :) Going to keep an eye on this group for sure. Something tells me they'll…
Reading the app description, more consistent data about fields + better budgeting towards fields would likely do it.
As an example, corn and soybeans are commonly rotated to help reduce the usage of nitrogen-based fertilizers in fields (soybeans put nitrogen in the ground, corn takes it out). If you have better data about nitrogen fixation, you can know if/when you should swap, and/or run the math on expected prices for soybeans vs. corn, irrigation costs, etc. Normally this is done in spreadsheets, but in the app you can get estimates and budgets for all of this stuff much faster (at least from what I read).
Farming is hard, and better support for data/analytics on farms is awesome.
Re: FarmLogs
#30There's similar project that's focused on cattle: farmeron.com