'Sky's the limit' for agritech startup

Next Farm brand manager Sammi Stewart and managing director Aaron Furrer. Photo: Supplied
Next Farm brand manager Sammi Stewart and managing director Aaron Furrer. Photo: Supplied
Two Dunedin-based entrepreneurs believe "the sky's the limit" for agritech startup Next Farm.

Managing director Aaron Furrer and brand manager Sammi Stewart recently spent a busy few days at National Fieldays at Mystery Creek where they exhibited in the innovation hub.

On Friday, they had their first meeting as one of the three winners of the 2019 Startup Dunedin Challenger Series.

The final phase of the series will include five months of mentoring and support from some of Dunedin's top business leaders. The pair were "really excited" to be part of that, Ms Stewart said.

Next Farm was about creating autonomous irrigation to enhance water management practices, maximising farm yields while minimising inputs.

In essence, it was about tailoring water and nutrient application to specific areas rather than blanket application, Mr Furrer said.

The idea came from a frustration faced by farmers around irrigation and effluent control. With so many sprinkler heads in the fixed grid system it was difficult to control in a way that was an efficient use of time and water.

With shifting weather conditions, it was difficult to make the best use of the water as irrigation schedules would need to be continuously adjusted.

A reliable method of monitoring effluent application was also an issue for farmers as system failures could result in environmental and council regulation repercussions.

It was several of the team at Dunedin agribusiness consulting company AbacusBio who were some of the original investors in what the idea of Next Farm could be.

They had full-time jobs and the project was not really going anywhere, and they asked Mr Furrer - at that stage working at AbacusBio - if he would be interested in taking it further.

Originally from a small farm in Washington state in the United States, Mr Furrer's connection with New Zealand came through his mother who travelled here 35 years ago, met a family and stayed in touch ever since.

He studied at Stanford and then worked with his father as an electrical apprentice before moving to Dunedin in 2016. He was applying for residency.

In April last year, Ms Stewart came on board, also with a rural background having grown up on a farm at Dipton.

After studying business at Canterbury, she moved overseas for a few years and ended up working in property in Edinburgh.

But it was not what she wanted to be doing and she returned home and was put in touch with Mr Furrer.

It was a great pairing of both her business and agricultural background, and she relished the opportunity to be outdoors and on farms.

Next Farm had two products; the Remote Irrigation Mesh (RIM) controller, and Efflutrack, a monitoring system for travelling irrigators.

RIM allowed users to control individual irrigation sprinklers across any irrigation or effluent system.

Each sprinkler in a grid could be controlled individually or as part of a group. That control allowed farmers to maximise the efficiency of water usage while minimising run-off.

It replaced the manual control of individual sprinklers, allowing farmers ease of access to tailor their irrigation schedules.

Efflutrack could be controlled from a cellphone with a text or call. In the event of an issue, the system automatically shut down to prevent environmental damage and alerted someone on farm to attend to the issue.

RIM was launched last season with 500 units across four different farms being tested in Central Otago.

They were looking at a commercial launch both in New Zealand and internationally at the end of 2020.

Efflutrack had been in the field for a while and an upgrade was recently done, with generation three of the product relaunched at National Fieldays.

It was Next Farm's second time at the event and it was a very important event to attend, Ms Stewart said.

Getting into places like the innovation hub there - and the Canterbury A&P Show innovation centre - drew many people.

That was valuable in helping build their brand and meeting other stakeholders in the industry.

Next Farm was looking to hold an on-farm demonstration day either later this year or early next year.

Irrigation was a "huge" market as, globally, 324 million hectares of land was irrigated and, of that, 11% was by using sprinkler methods.

About 40% of global food production was crops grown using irrigation and 20% of all farmland was irrigated.

Food production needed to be increased to feed the world's growing population and so it was all about creating efficiencies.

"Water is becoming a scarce and precious resource. With these new methods, we can improve and still grow," Mr Furrer said.

The package of what Next Farm was offering was a combination that had not been done before and "really allows these efficiencies moving forward".

The focus was on designing around simplicity and reliability; they were very conscious that they were designing for a demographic that was aged 55-plus, so it had to be simple to operate. It also needed to be quite comprehensive.

The pair were very grateful for the support of Callaghan Innovation, saying they "wouldn't be here" without it.

Next Farm was also part of the Sprout accelerator which backed agritech businesses and entrepreneurs.

New Zealand's agritech sector was "really taking off" and that was also largely due to the help from Agritech New Zealand, Ms Stewart said.

Next Farm was also enjoying the "amazing" startup ecosystem in Dunedin while Ms Stewart said it was also nice to see the "bridge" between Otago and Southland.

Next Farm was looking to hire an embedded firmware engineer and a full stack developer, both integral roles in the company to help develop its products.

For anyone wanting to be part of the founding team, there were lots of bonuses about working with a startup, Ms Stewart said.


 

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