Hitachi, senior manager business development, Derrick Thompson said Beef 2018 was an opportunity for the company to showcase their technologies outside of industrial machinery to the beef industry.
“We have two stands here, one specifically focused on our drone technology and processes intelligence for the farm,” he said.
Mr Thompson said the company was proud to show off there investment in future technologies.
“We are doing trials in conjunction with the Japanese government and local research,” he said.
“Where we are using a satellite to directly control an autonomous tractor.
“Also using it to control an unmanned aerial vehicle or drone.”
Mr Thompson said the technology has been paddock tested in rice, sugarcane and horticultural farming systems.
“The satellite directly controls the vehicle without any intervention from a ground station,” he said.
Hitachi believe there are several benefits in using a satellite without intervention from a base station.
“It free’s up labour to do other activities,” Mr Thompson said.
“Because the tractor can run day and night, completely uninterrupted, means you can cover more of your tasks.
“it also can produce cost saving, because the actual satellite itself is provided by the Japanese government free of charge at the present time.
“Also you don’t need a ground station and all the infrastructure that goes with that.”
Mr Thompson said the technology also could offer safety benefits to industry.
“It’s safer, they can do jobs like sugarcane cutting without someone in the machine,” he said.
Mr Thompson said the technology did not solely rely on instruction from the satellite.
“The control comes from the sky, the algorithms to interpret the position are based in the tractor,” he said.
“The tractor also has all the programming capability to allow it to turn around and do the mission we want it to do.
“That could be a simple U-turn to do accurate rows, do a fish-turn and run it up to a couple of centimetre accuracy.
Mr Thompson said with the technology the farmer can be driving the technology from the office or somewhere else on the farm.
“Once the tractor is set going with it’s mission you can walk away and it just goes and does it’s thing.”
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