Raven Acquires Two Autonomous Ag Technologies

Raven Industries recently announced the acquisitions of two independent autonomous farm equipment companies after releasing a five-year plan to significantly increase its investment in autonomous technologies.

On Oct. 30, the company announced the acquisition of a majority interest in Dot Technologies, a member company based in Canada that has developed the Dot Power Platform and Dot Ready Implements.

Two days later, Raven announced it acquired Smart Ag, an autonomous systems developer based in Ames, Iowa.

How the acquisitions and further commercialization of autonomous systems will evolve Raven’s dealer network remains to be seen.

Rob Saik, CEO of Dot Technology, notes that the flexibility of its platform could create some new opportunities with dealers and manufacturers.

“For shortline implement manufacturers, Dot is an open, U-shaped platform. So we’re open to talk to shortliners and OEMs about how to integrate their equipment into the Dot platform. So there’s lots of reasons why people need to take a look at the Dot (system), and we’re just happy to be able to supply a path to autonomy for the agricultural sector.”

Forty-two percent of dealers who responded to the 2019 Precision Farming Dealer Benchmark study cited autonomous equipment as being an important part of growing revenue during the next five years.

Source: Precison Farming Dealer

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