Indigo agriculture

I am always amazed by our inability of transferring knowledge, assumptions, processes, or thinking from one area into another. Many times, we can’t understand one’s actions and we criticize this person, but then apply the same mentality in another area and we justify it with the same arguments as the person we have criticized. This is why Indigo Agriculture is so successful. They have realized that no farmland is the same, so why do we treat every piece of it the same way? By using this mentality, they are trying to create a system that will recognize the environmental differences in the local environment, so they will be able to tell the farmers, how to naturally increase their crop’s yields, therefore their profits. It is customization of local fields on a massive scale!

The company is a spin-off from Flagship Pioneering — a company that has created many pharmaceutical and biotech companies over the past decades. Indigo Agriculture was initially intended to sell only seeds, which were exposed to a specific type of microbes. The goal was to create a seed for rice, wheat, cotton, soy, and corn, which returns more yield than the chemically treated seeds. This goal was achieved by creating seeds that could grow in a much harsher environment. However, they have realized that no field is the same; they have different dirt compositions and are affected by different environmental factors. Why don’t they just collect all possible data, needed for the seed to flourish and customize the seed based on these factors? This is how Indigo Research Partners was created.

With Indigo Research Partners, they are trying to create the world’s largest agriculture lab. We can assume that is really difficult to create meaningful tests out on the fields for a different product because there are so many always-changing environmental factors. Also, based on the words of Indigo Agriculture: “there is no gold standard by which to evaluate new technologies in agriculture.” This is why farmers don’t trust companies selling new products or seeds to them. They basically have to trust their word and lab experiments that by using their products, they will be able to increase their crop’s yields. If you are a farmer, you already risk a lot, due to unstable weather. A new product may create an additional risk that you aren’t willing to take. Because of that, small farmers are slowing down innovation, because they are usually much more confident to use the products that they’ve been using for years rather than trying something new. This is why Indigo Research Partners are trying to create a new golden standard for R&D in agriculture. It is based on four of their beliefs:

• “The best labs for agricultural R&D are farms. The performance of new technologies can only be understood if they are tested in real-world conditions.”
• “Modern technologies and sensors can turn real-world conditions into an asset for conducting valuable experiments, rather than an obstacle.”
• “Farmer-led R&D is more valuable and trustworthy, driving both better decisions and faster market adoption of successful products.”
• “An open platform for real-world product testing will improve market access for new technologies, reduce costs for innovators, and accelerate agricultural innovation.”

Remember we said that they are trying to create the world’s largest agriculture lab? They are not kidding about it. They are creating over a trillion data points each day! How? By collecting every possible data that they can from different farms by using sensors, weather stations, soil mapping technologies, drones, and satellites. Yup, satellites! They have bought TellusLabs, which is gathering and interpreting data collected by satellites. There is also no doubt that they will sell these vast quantities of data to other companies. This is how they will have leverage on them.

The company uses machine learning to interpret data, gathered by publicly available satellites and different publicly available crop and weather data. The result? Based on the description in Wired magazine, they have predicted US corn crop yield in 2017 with 99% accuracy. If this is true, they have created one of the most useful machine learning systems I have heard of. They can use it for predicting crop prices, different countries' production, and also for creating experiments on a massive scale. The created system gives them a lot of power and consequently a lot of responsibilities. How good is this system, you may ask? They have bragged about themselves twice for providing better information than the US Department of Agriculture. Huh, crazy.

Most likely this AI system will be used for helping farmers to increase their crop yield. As we mentioned before, they are trying to collect as much data of one field as they can, so they can customize their products for it. Not only that they can customize their products, but also, they will know how to efficiently use the land and have more precise information on the composition of the crop. This has the potential to change the way farmers do their work.

They have also noticed something that was contradicting their beliefs. They were certain that no field is like any other, which probably means no composition of the crop is exactly the same. If this is true, why are farmers then mixing the same crop from different fields? The fields’ uniqueness gets lost in all this quantity. Why is this so important? Well, because different buyers would prefer different composition of the crop, based on the product they are using the crop in. This is one of the reasons why Indigo has created its own marketplace.

Buyers on this marketplace will receive a lot more information about the crop they are buying than just trying to gather the data themselves. They could also ask Indigo Agriculture to do an additional quality check on their behalf. This is how they can be reassured about the goods they are buying. When a deal is made, the goods could be shipped with Indigo Transport — another service that Indigo Agriculture offers. By choosing Indigo Transport, both sides could reduce the costs. If the deal isn’t closed, farmers can sell their goods through another channel. It is up to them.

Remember when I said in another article that companies can become huge if they create the infrastructure for others? Well, this is happing with Indigo Agriculture. They have the data about fields, crops and weather, so they can help farmers to increase their yield. The company has also created a marketplace where transactions occur, due to more precise data and they help the participants with the logistics. What more do you want as a farmer? The company is clearly creating an ecosystem, where farmers would get everything they need. Of course, we mustn’t neglect that they will become the data company of agriculture. The power that the will or do poses it just mind-blowing. If you are a company that for whatever reason needs the data on agriculture, you will have to go to Indigo. This is how they can keep an eye on their competitors. Not only that but also, they will have a lot of data on companies that buy goods on their marketplace. They will know how much, what can of goods and when are they buying the crop. They definitely have a competitive advantage.

Why is this company interesting for us? Because they are tackling one of the most difficult questions out there; how to efficiently use the land, so we can feed more people. More and more people will live on this planet, so we need to find a way to produce more food without damaging the environment. Projects like this make us realize that we can solve our self-made problems with our ingenuity.