nir-vana innovation network

An Italian ICT company has taken part in a european funded project with 6 european research centers to create an advanced decision support system (DSS) applied to the precision kiwi fruit cultivation. This system combines satellite data with other data sources (ground-based sensors, manned and unmanned aircraft) and sends them to a spatial data infrastructure (SDI) based on a machine learning approach. The end products are well-structured and user-friendly web decision support systems (DSS) for precision kiwi fruit cultivation easily extensible to other crops.
This DSS system allows a single producer, a consortia or an association of producers or certification bodies to benefit from timely and accurate information and suggestions to improve kiwi fruit cultivation.
Hourly weather data are collected by the company’s data collection system. Mathematical models calculate every day, for each pixel acquired, all the plant growth outputs, three-dimensional soil water balance and plant disease. The user can control the actions performed in the field and correct the model’s outputs. The expert system combines all the outputs, including models, forecasting and ground measurements, providing prescriptions and alerts. It is also possible to add direct observation by satellite and/or aircraft, and data manually measured on the ground. The system can manage all user permissions in reading and writing. Mobile and web user interface are also available.
The company is looking in the agrifood sector for:
- industrial partners for the installation of the system (antenna, receiver, server) at the clients' headquarters, under a commercial agreement with technical assistance;
- industries interested in IPR acquisition, under a license agreement;
- re-seller or final users for the distribution and reselling of the services systems, under a commercial agreement with technical assistance;
- ICT companies or research center to further improvement of the system, under research cooperation or technical cooperation agreement.

Advantages & innovations

The system allows the users to: - address quality and production variability issues, by means of an advanced decision support system; - receive notification and alerts by sms and email; - export final prescription maps for variable rate technology or for any kind of intervention in the field assisting the users in day to day management; - increase efficiency, timeliness and localization of all kinds of interventions, reducing the risks of diseases and increasing fruit’s organoleptic potential; - overcome the kiwi fruit quality fragmentation in the same field, allowing an holistic vision of all the area vegetative behavior, so that it is possible to monitoring and improving quality; - boost the producers’ marketing opportunities by providing maps, graphs, images and reports of their productions, that can also be effectively used as marketing tool for promoting their products; - use machine learning approach to provide prescriptions; - continuously produce all outputs, pixel per pixel (from 1 to 30 meters resolution) starting from hourly data; - be independent from ground sensors.

Stage of development

Already on the market

Partner sought

The company is looking in for: - industrial partners, in the agrifood sector, for the installation and improvement of the system under a commercial agreement with technical assistance; - industries, also in the agrifood sector, interested in IPR acquisition, under a license agreement; - commercial partners for the distribution and reselling of the services systems, under a commercial agreement with technical assistance; - companies or research center that work in the ICT and agrifood sector, to further development of the system, under research cooperation or technical cooperation agreement.