Future of Agriculture Tim Hammerich

Headstorm: https://headstorm.com/
AGPILOT: https://headstorm.com/agpilot/
Azure Data Manager for Agriculture (ADMA): https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/products/data-manager-for-agriculture
Ag Powered Services: https://agpoweredservices.com/
"Scaling Sustainability Through Bayer & Microsoft Partnership": https://www.bayer.com/en/agriculture/bayer-and-microsoft-partnership
Today's episode features conversations with Claudia Roessler and Mark Pendergrast. A quick heads up on a couple of things before we dive in: first, both of these interviews were recorded at World Agri-Tech in San Francisco and they were other conversations happening in the media room for part of the time, so I hope you’ll forgive a little bit of background noise. Second, similar to Amie Thesingh’s episode last month, I originally recorded these interviews to be spotlight episodes featuring the work Headstorm does. Just like in Amie’s case I thought this story warranted a full-length episode, so we will focus on the work Microsoft and Bayer are doing together, but I will also include the role Headstorm is playing in all of this as well. Just a heads up on that. 
You heard from both Claudia and Mark as part of our Generative AI episode which was #409, but the focus today is on this initiative started by Microsoft with their Azure Data Manager for Agriculture, or ADMA. We’ll also explore the collaboration with Bayer Cropscience, in particular they’re Ag Powered Services Platform that brings together agronomic data for a variety of applications. 
Because sometimes this data stuff can get a little abstract, I think it’s probably helpful to level-set with some basics. Starting with cloud services. I think most of us intuitively know what a massive leap forward cloud computing has been for technology in general. From software applications to file storage to other sources of data - cloud computing is how we are able to power digitization. The cloud is not new obviously. But what has become clear is that just giving people access to the cloud isn’t enough to really tap into the power of all of this information - it’s just a place to store it. Moving from stored data to actionable data is a very very heavy lift - especially in an industry like agriculture. 
So, Microsoft started creating industry-specific data management platforms. They describe this as “industry-specific data connectors and capabilities to connect farm data from disparate sources.” They’ve been successful with similar efforts in other industries like retail, finance and healthcare, and last year they unveiled Azure Data Manager for Agriculture, a continuation of the work they were doing with FarmBeats, which you might remember from episode 266 with Microsoft’s Ranveer Chandra. 
So when it comes to making data more valuable, the cloud is a massive step forward, now we have another massive step forward in ADMA, and we’re also going to talk about what could be yet another massive step forward Bayer’s Ag Powered Services. Bayer is providing additional data infrastructure that they first developed to use internally, and now are offering to other companies that rely on agronomic data to power their various digital applications. 
The ultimate goal here though is that data no longer becomes the bottleneck to progress. If a buyer, for example, wants to pay a farmer more for certain agronomic practices, all they need is...

Headstorm: https://headstorm.com/
AGPILOT: https://headstorm.com/agpilot/
Phospholutions: https://www.phospholutions.com/
Sentinel Fertigation: https://www.sentinelfertigation.com/
I’m a firm believer that in the U.S. our agricultural research and extension programs at our land grant universities truly are national treasures. But of all the outstanding research that’s done at these institutions every year, not enough of it seems to get commercialized. Today we highlight two young entrepreneurs that each began their entrepreneurial journeys at their respective campuses, and are today growing real businesses helping farmers with different aspects of nutrient management. 
Today, you'll hear from Hunter Swisher, founder and CEO of Phospholutions which initially commercialized research done at Penn State. He does a great job talking about some of the major issues with the status quo when it comes to phosphorous. If you haven’t looked into it before it’s seriously eye opening. 
Then we’ll move west to Nebraska, where Jackson Stensell formed his company Sentinel Fertigation based on research he was doing as a grad student at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He also focuses on nutrient management but specifically on irrigated crops. 
Hunter Swisher currently serves as the President and Chief Executive Officer of Phospholutions, Inc., which he founded prior to graduating with his B.S. degree in Plant Sciences from Pennsylvania State University. Phospholutions is a sustainable fertilizer company with the mission of improving global phosphate efficiency. 
Jackson Stansell is the founder and CEO of Sentinel Fertigation. Sentinel Fertigation leverages satellite imagery and geospatial data to empower precision nutrient management - particularly for nitrogen fertigation. Originally from Dothan, Alabama, Jackson did his undergrad at Harvard where he also played football. He was pursuing a masters degree at Nebraska when he turned the research he was doing into a business and decided to put his PhD on hold to commercialize the technology.

Headstorm: https://headstorm.com/
AGPILOT: https://headstorm.com/agpilot/
4AG Robotics: https://4ag.ai/
As you heard a bit about in last weeks episode, mushrooms are an incredible indoor crop with a ton of advantages and potential. But they are also extremely labor intensive. 
“When you have a crop that doubles in size every 24 hours, you're often picking mushrooms at the end of the shift because you know that they'll start colliding with other mushrooms or their caps will open up by the next morning. So you pick them too quickly. Whereas if you know, I can come back in three hours and pick that, you'll gain the extra yield and weight that'll come with it. A robot is, is able to do that, that you know, shift labor can't accommodate.”
Sean O’Connor and the team at 4AG Robotics are bringing automation to this industry. But they’re not the first to have this idea, which means they have to work a bit harder to gain farmers’ trust. 
“Decades of people saying that we're gonna solve harvesting through automation, much like the rest of agriculture as well, and decades of people being wrong. So that barrier for acceptance of an MVP is very low, and you gotta have something that truly adds value to them from day one.”
Today is not only an education in mushroom farming, but a candid look on what it takes to bring technology to an established industry. Sean O’Connor  of 4AG Robotics on today’s Future of Agriculture podcast.

Headstorm: https://headstorm.com/
AGPILOT: https://headstorm.com/agpilot/
Ecovative: https://www.ecovative.com/
MyForest Foods: https://myforestfoods.com/
I’ve been meaning to do an episode on mushroom farming and mushroom technology for a long long time. But the right story just never presented itself. Then I got connected with Ecovative and about the same time got in touch with the subject of next weeks’ interview and all of a sudden I have two fascinating stories of fungi! And these aren’t far-fetched companies: they are proving commercially that mushroom farming shouldn’t be kept in the dark when it comes to the future of agriculture. In fact, when you think about the vast diversity of fungi that exist in nature, it’s surprising to me that we haven't seen more done to commercialize them for food, fiber and other resources (relative to domesticated plants and animals). But there are reasons to believe that’s starting to change, and will likely be accelerated through advancements in biotechnology in my opinion. 
So this is a great time to bring on Eben Bayer, co-founder and CEO of Ecovative, which he co-founded clear back in 2007. Ecovative is now the leading mycelium technology company in the world. He is also Co-founder of MyForest Foods, and is listed as an inventor on 64+ patents. 
Eben grew up working on his family's farm in Vermont, where he began thinking of mycelium as a new category of material with myriad possibilities. He has since developed mycelium technology into the basis of sustainable innovations across industrial categories, including applications in construction, packaging, food, automotive, fashion and apparel.
We will of course focus on his work in food and specifically on the bacon product made from his mycelium.

Headstorm: https://headstorm.com/
AGPILOT: https://headstorm.com/agpilot/
Wilbur-Ellis: https://www.wilburellis.com/
Today's episode features Amie Thesingh, president of ag solutions and chief technology officer at Wilbur-Ellis. Today’s episode is a perfect compliment to last week’s episode with Brad Fruth of Beck’s Hybrids. Both Beck’s and Wilbur-Ellis are well-established family-owned companies that aren’t just resting on their laurels. They’re looking ahead and wanting to be on the cutting edge of technology and innovation. Like last week’s episode, the perspective Amie shares is both grounded in the realities of how agriculture really works, but also forward-looking and open to how the industry is evolving and changing. 
In Amie’s role, she has to wear three different hats: 
Strategy and business development for the company as a wholeRunning their ag solutions business, which includes digital solutions, sustainable grower solutions, and their proprietary products portfolio - really focuses on innovation and the futureAnd the IT function - how they’re using digital and data internally
So it’s a big job for the 103 year-old leading international marketer and distributor of agricultural products, animal nutrition and specialty chemicals and ingredients.
Amie joined Wilbur-Ellis in 2020, bringing deep strategy, commercial and general management expertise to her role, along with experience that spans the food, agribusiness and technology industries. Before Wilbur-Ellis, Thesingh held a variety of leadership roles at Cargill, where she developed and executed solutions for farmers, including new product development. Most recently, she was Vice President of Strategy, Marketing and Innovation for Cargill’s protein businesses in Latin America, Europe and Asia. She created the first global strategy and acquisition portfolio across these regions, identified the critical levers for aggressive organic and M&A growth, and subsequently took responsibility for go-to-market and innovation improvement efforts.
And that’s where i’ll drop you into today’s conversation, where Amie is talking about her valuable experience at Cargill, and how that set her up for her current role at Wilbur-Ellis. 

Headstorm: https://headstorm.com/
AGPILOT: https://headstorm.com/agpilot/
Software is Feeding The World: https://www.rhishipethe.com/sftw
Beck's Hybrids: https://www.beckshybrids.com/
The word “innovation” is tossed around quite a bit - I’m guilty of overusing it myself. But what does it mean? There’s probably no better person to dig into this question at least in agriculture than Beck’s Hybrids director of innovation Brad Fruth. 
“Ideas are cheap.  Motivated people that are passionate about their ideas is what is lacking.”
Beck’s Hybrids is the largest family-owned retail seed company and the third-largest seed brand in the country. But it’s Brad’s views on innovation and adding value to customers that really stand out today me in today’s episode.
“Focus on what we're good at, which is seed, and the selection of seed, the placement and management of it, but then partner with best in breed on everything else.”
Today, Brad shares some of the specific ways Beck’s Hybrids adds value to their farmer customers, and he shares openly and candidly his views on the current state of ag technology. 
“If you don't have a good value prop and you're not delivering value, then this is just the inevitable. Right? And so the industry probably needs a little bit of belt tightening to make sure that you are delivering direct farm value and you're just not blowing smoke.” 
Brad Fruth of Beck’s Hybrids sits down with guest host Rhishi Pethe on today’s Future of Agriculture podcast. Brad is the  is the director of innovation at Beck’s. He started there as an intern and has now worked there for about 20 years. Over that time, he has been dedicated to converging IT, data and agriculture into real solutions for farmer customers. This background gives him a perspective that you will really enjoy hearing because it is both technical and relatable, and always focused on what makes a meaningful impact at the farm level. 
Today’s interview was put together by our guest host, Rhishi Pethe. This is now the third episode Rhishi has brought to the program after Verdant Robotics in 391 and Lavoro Agro in 404. As many of you know, Rhishi writes the newsletter Software is Feeding the World. If for some reason you are not subscribed, you’ll find a link to do so in the show notes.