Four years later, a major milestone
Plus, hackers hold milking robot ransom
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Hackers hold milking robot ransom
A dairyman in Switzerland wasn’t able to access the data from his milking robot after hackers hijacked it and held it ransom. While the robots still worked (i.e., milked the dairyman’s cows), the data they collected about health and productivity was tied up with ransomware. The dairyman declined to pay the ransom of $10,000 since the robots were still working, but he said he did lose a pregnant cow while working his dairy herd ‘data-blind.’
Read more about the incident here.
Note: I believe most farmers around the world would have the same response as this farmer. Imagine, however, what a cyberattack would mean if hackers had made the robots inoperative. We can only assume they will try again.
Startup launches machine learning software
to revolutionize animal welfare
A Colorado-based company recently launched machine learning software designed to help researchers and companies annotate animal behavior, events and welfare indicators. The software from AgriGates aims to develop deeper insights and deploy machine learning to advance welfare and health in complex areas of food animal agriculture.
The software from AgriGates offers innovative features such as data notation of behaviors and events in wearable and camera data. The machine-learning capabilities enable auto-annotation and analysis of animal behavior, providing deeper insights and capabilities that will improve animals’ lives and health, along with knowledge on animal welfare and behavior.
To learn more about the company, click here.
Virtual fencing startup enters U.S. market
New Zealand-based virtual fencing startup Halter has entered the U.S. market recently. The company claims it is the world’s leading virtual fence company in revenue and number of collars sold to date – more than 200,000 worldwide.
“Halter technology is a powerful system that helps users precisely manage pasture to lift the performance of the animals grazing it,” says Craig Piggott, Halter founder and CEO. “For years, farmers in New Zealand and Australia have generated significant benefits from utilizing the technology, and we’re excited to bring these same benefits to U.S. cattle ranchers.”
The company already has a few U.S. customers in California, Oregon, Colorado, Texas and Louisiana. The company’s founder recently talked about the progress the technology has made:
“If I know what I know now about the challenges we would have to solve, I wouldn’t have started. I’m glad I did though. It’s been the best thing ever.” Hear more about how the company came to be from the CEO here.
Read more about the company’s U.S. launch here.
New cattle facial recognition startup emerges
A new cattle facial recognition startup claims to be able to recognize cattle from up to 50 feet away. The company – 406 Bovine – also claims its API can interface with cattle management programs to enable dairy farmers and ranchers to use to its facial recognition as a means to access an animal’s individual health record in those programs.
Read more here.
Another enteric methane reduction solution launches in Australia. Read more about it here.
Teat spray robot wins breakthrough award
DeLaval’s teat spray robot – the TSR2 – was selected as the Overall Agriculture Robotics Solution of the Year in the 2024 AgTech Breakthrough Awards. More than 1,900 nominations were submitted for breakthrough awards in 17 different categories. All award nominations were evaluated and scored by an expert panel of judges, representing a mix of technical, business, academic and marketing expertise within the industry.
The company’s second-generation robot was introduced last year with improvements for pre- and post-teat spray application for rotary milking systems.
Read more about it here.