The Internet of Things — the vision of a world brimming with communicating sensors and digital smarts — occupies the peak of Gartner’s most recent “hype cycle.” And a report released two months ago by the McKinsey Global Institute laid out the potential multitrillion-dollar payoff from the emerging technology.At a two-day workshop last week in San Jose, Calif., hosted by the National Science Foundation and the National Consortium for Data Science, a few dozen academics, corporate technologists and government officials met and mostly wrestled with the thorny technical and policy issues that must be addressed if the potential of the Internet of Things is to be realized. They were working to come up with a research agenda to make practical progress on challenges like security, privacy and standards. A glimpse of the looming security concerns came two weeks ago, when Fiat Chrysler recalled 1.4 million vehicles after two researchers hacked into a Jeep Cherokee and showed they could remotely control its engine, brakes and steering.But the Silicon Valley gathering also underlined the societal needs that Internet-of-Things technology could help address. Lance Donny, founder of an agricultural technology start-up, OnFarm Systems, gave a wide-ranging talk that laid out the history of farming and presented the case for its data-driven future. Inexpensive sensors, cloud computing and intelligent software, he suggested, hold the potential to transform agriculture and help feed the world’s growing population.Venture capitalists seem to share some of Mr. Donny’s optimism. In the first half of this year, venture investment in so-called agtech start-ups reached $2.06 billion in 228 deals, according to a study published last week by AgFunder, an equity crowdfunding platform for agricultural technology. The half-year total was close to the $2.36 billion raised in all of 2014, which was a record year.In his presentation, Mr. Donny placed the progression of farming in three stages. The first, preindustrial agriculture, dating from before Christ to about 1920, consisted of labor-intensive, essentially subsistence farming on small farms, which took two acres to feed one person. In the second stage, industrial agriculture, from 1920 to about 2010, tractors and combine harvesters, chemical fertilizers and seed science opened the way to large commercial farms. One result has been big gains in productivity, with one acre feeding five people.The third stage, which Mr. Donny calls Ag 3.0, is just getting underway and involves exploiting data from many sources — sensors on farm equipment and plants, satellite images and weather tracking. In the near future, the use of water and fertilizer will be measured and monitored in detail, sometimes on a plant-by-plant basis....MORE
"Yup, I used to raise corn for ethanol. But then the topsoil blew away and I couldn't even get enough juice to run my tractor or get drunk on Saturday. Then this stranger came to town. Ordered something called a 'la-tay' and called himself a 'vee-cee.' Said he'd give me $20 million to come to Californee and herd algae. So we packed up our furniture in his little toy car and came west. Now I've got a regular bonanza of the slimy critters and the kids got shoes. Hain't looked over my shoulder back east since."
-from our post "Algaen Gothic"
As usual, apologies to the Grant Wood estate, the Art Institute of Chicago et al.
See also:
Agriculture is the New Cleantech: Kleiner Partner Launching Farmer Network?
Venture Capital Down on the Farm
Venture Capital: "Selling Agriculture 2.0 to Silicon Valley"
Silicon Valley to Focus on Ag in Central Valley and Beyond
Agriculture VCs Seek $200M Fund II
