Production Blog

If knowledge is power, then data most certainly holds dominion over today's row-crop farming operations.

It is data -- collected from the cab of the tractor, combine or sprayer -- that farmers now use to drive many decisions they hope lead to increased efficiencies, higher yields and ultimately a greater return on investment. While collecting and using this data has increased steadily, it has not always been easy to share it across platforms or with multiple partners.

This is the problem that Precision Planting seeks to solve with its newest product, Panorama, which the company announced this week during its 30th annual winter conference. While attending the meeting, DTN learned the product features a new application programming interface (API) through which other industry data platforms can connect to the Precision Planting system, allowing data to flow seamlessly from the company's 20|20 monitor.

"Panorama is a project that has been focused on modernizing how the 20|20 interacts with the rest of the world," Justin McMenamy, Precision Planting's vice president of disruptive products, told conference attendees while unveiling the new interface. "The definition of panorama is an unobstructed view of one's environment, and that is our passion for you ... that you would have an unobstructed view of your farm data. Our passion is to make the 20|20 data the most portable data in the entire industry."

Panorama will feature map viewing, reporting and the ability for farmers to allow their Precision Planting dealers to provide remote technology support. McMenamy added that Precision Planting remains committed to its current partnership with Climate FieldView.

"The 20|20 and FieldView is an experience that we are passionate about and will continue to be passionate about into the future," he said. "But what we have heard from you is that you want to see your 20|20 information in other places in the industry, with other partners in the industry, paired up with the rest of the information on your farm."

Beta testing for Panorama is slated for this spring in the United States and Canada. Further release plans will be announced later in 2023. Once released, Panorama will be offered as a phone app as well as through a browser-based experience.

"We designed the Panorama app so that you can tell your story with your 20|20 information," McMenamy said. "Whether you're telling the story at the farm shop, at the coffee shop, with the landlady or with the agronomist, we want you to be able to share your year, share your practices with others."

SPRAYER PRODUCT UPDATE

At its winter conference last year, Precision Planting announced it was entering the sprayer business with the development of several new products. This week, senior product manager Luke Stuber updated conference attendees on one of those products.

"We've now gone to commercial production with ReClaim," he said about the company's retrofit boom priming and recirculation system. "It gives you the ability to take spray from the tank to the boom and then flow it back to tank. So, you can prime your boom. You can also recirculate, so if you're worried about something settling out, you can run the system to keep things agitated. And it also gives you the ability to purge, so at the end of the day, you can hook up a compressed air line and actually blow the chemical back into the tank."

He added that because it uses low pressure recirculation, ReClaim can work with any type of nozzles that might be on a sprayer.

Stuber and fellow senior product manager Jason Stoller also provided updates on Precision Planting's Symphony products that are still under development. These include a nozzle control system that allows for consistent pressure across a boom, even as speed and application rate change; and a vision-based spraying system called Symphony Targeted Spraying. It uses camera technologies and artificial intelligence to vary spray rate based on weed size and pressure.

Stoller shared field data from prototype testing in 2022. Instead of applying a blanket application of herbicide across entire fields, the Symphony system only spot sprayed when it detected weeds. In one field, herbicide use was reduced by 77%; in another, it was reduced by 84%.

"If you take a look at the potential from an input savings perspective, it's phenomenal," Stoller said. "But I think there's a bigger opportunity than just the savings. With Symphony Targeted Spray, we now have the flexibility to make a different decision than maybe we could have or would have in the past. There's real opportunity to do a better job of weed control."

Jason Jenkins can be reached at jason.jenkins@dtn.com

Follow him on Twitter @JasonJenkinsDTN

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