The Teyme Group, which designs, manufactures and sells agricultural machinery, and the Eurecat technology centre have developed technological solutions powered by artificial intelligence and robotics to automate in-field processes based on agriculture 4.0 to bring more sustainable and productive equipment to the industry.
“What we do is add sensors to our equipment, gather data and strive for best in-field practice whilst making sure that the processes are automatic,” says Ferran Iturbe, Teyme Group’s CEO. This means that “the machine can decide how many litres per hectare to spray and even apply plant health products tree by tree and in each tree area for matchless crop protection.”
Introducing these technologies into fields “helps to improve farming operations by furnishing tools to address the industry’s challenges,” adds Daniel Serrano, director of Eurecat’s Robotics and Automation Unit. “They bring precision to repetitive tasks, reduce downtime costs, soil compaction and human exposure to chemical products and lots more.”
Hybridising multiple disruptive technologies “is crucial to deliver new opportunities for agribusinesses to tackle challenges in efficiency, quality and productivity and also in sustainability,” notes Carlos Rizzo, head of Ground Robotics in Eurecat’s Robotics and Automation Unit.
This is the case of the SCORPION project, in which the Teyme Group and Eurecat have helped to develop a fully autonomous electric robot for mountain vineyard treatments by designing the autonomous localisation and navigation software. It is a modular autonomous robot which adds value to small agricultural equipment by automating and streamlining spraying operations using innovative ecological methods.
The company and the technology centre have also teamed up under Robs4Crops, a project to spur widespread uptake of farming robotics by large companies and also small and medium-sized production enterprises.
