IPPro Issue 002

Agricultural Technology
Sowing the seeds
Doris Spielthenner of Practice Insight discusses the recent developments
and innovations in the agricultural technology area
There have been a number of interesting announcements recently
about innovations in the agricultural technology area, such as
precision or automation farming. Developments include:
Walmart’s new patents on drones for farming automation,
indicating a new player possibly planning to enter this space
AgEagle Aerial Systems’, an automated farming drone innovator,
merger with EnerJex Resources, an exploration company
Soil sensor manufacturer, Teralytic, deploying LoRa technology
from Semtech in their wireless sensors to detect nitrogen,
phosphate and potassium levels in soil to reduce waste and
improve crop yields
However, this is just a small snippet of the recent developments in
this area, which contain business opportunities that law firms should
not miss out on. In the second half of this article, I’ll share with you,
how you may able to grow your footprint in this market.
The agtech sector in recent years has garnered a lot of attention,
not only from the food and agriculture industry, but also the general
public due to issues including food or a shortage thereof is an
important consideration for the future of humanity as we face the
growing effects of climate instability; shortage of farmers and people
taking up farming as a profession; and the growing population and its
impact on food and land requirements.
Agriculture can be a difficult industry to work in because of its
land and freshwater requirements, which directly compete with its
consumers—the general population. It’s a catch 22 situation, as the
population increases so does the demand for food. Yet at the same
time, the available land and freshwater for agriculture decreases.
The use of technology to try and overcome these issues is
revolutionising the way farming is planned and executed. Because of
this, the agricultural technology area continues to grow and so does
the patenting activity and the emergence of start-ups.
From this we see the emergence of innovative solutions such as:
Disclaimer: All this information is publicly available under registered sources for different jurisdictions. The screenshots and numbers in this article have been identified by using software, Filing Analytics,
developed and managed by Practice Insight, which collects these information points from diverse sources and makes the data readily available and easily searchable, whilst also providing further data analytics.
Robotics and drones: At the forefront of hardware innovation
in agtech are the drone manufacturers and service providers
that offer monitoring and automating capabilities to farmers. In
addition, robots or intelligent farm equipment that can perform
farming functions more efficiently is increasing. Examples of
start-up companies working in these areas include, Terravion,
Blue River Tech, Farmbot, and Mavrx.
Farming sensors: This area is at the heart of AgTech farming.
Collecting data on crop health, weather, soil quality and moisture
levels with the help of farming sensors will increase farming
efficiency. Centaur, Spensa, Phytech, and Sencrop are all
examples of companies working in the farming sensors area.
Farm management platforms: These platforms allow farmers
to efficiently manage their resources, crop and yield production
and livestock. Companies such as AEGRO, Farmlogs, Agriwebb,
and Farmdok are producing new technology developments in
this area.
Data management and analytics: Focusing on using machine
learning and big data analytics to manage and analyse data on
farm and livestock, that can assist farmers to make informed
decisions that can save energy, increase efficiency, optimise
herbicide and pesticide application, and manage risk. Companies
such as Strider, Cibo, Prospera, TL biolabs, Farmnote, Gamaya,
CropZilla, and Agralogics are providing data management and
analytics solutions.
Smart irrigation: Systems for monitoring and automating water
supply and usage for farms. Companies such as Flowius, cropX,
Aquaspy, and Tevatronic are some examples of startups in this
area.
Indoor farming: Indoor farming and hydroponics provide an
alternative solution to the agricultural land shortage problem.
InFarm are currently working in this area.
Autonomous farming equipment and vehicles plus navigation
technology is moving at a fast pace. In some cases, the development
is perceived to be even faster than in the standard automobile
industry, as these off-road farming vehicles don’t have to deal with
standard road challenges such as changing lanes, pedestrians, and
other drivers on the road.
The agricultural technology field is filled with many business
development opportunities for attorneys and law firms to obtain,
as innovative start-ups produce new patents. Keeping in mind that
there is the disadvantage of a low volume of work while they are in
their infancy. While corporates may offer higher volumes, trying to
establish a new business relationship with them can be a difficult and
time consuming process.
Further, many corporates will do their filing in-house or have
a preference for using an established group of law firms.
For example, Bayer CropScience AG is a fairly ‘captured’ client, as
they regularly use the same law firms to represent them in various
jurisdictions, but more importantly they self-file a large volume of
their work.
As the field of agricultural
technology area continues to grow,
law firms should weigh up the time and
expenditure they would need to invest to
break into the market of being a preferred
law firm for an existing corporate, against
obtaining work from agtech start-ups
What this means is that although the overall filing volume by Bayer
CropScience is large, only a small portion of it is available for external
law firms, and possibly none at all for any new law firms to try and obtain.
Another example of where a corporate already has many pre-existing
business relationships with law firms is Monsanto. While Monsanto
doesn’t have a large volume of self-filed applications, they appear
to have very strong existing business relationships with external law
firms, who get regular filings from them year by year. A snapshot
of the PCT case flow for Monsanto LLC (US) from Filing Analytics
displays this aspect clearly. Please note that law firm names have
been replaced with generic titles such as “law firm A”.
However, startups have only a few patent filings due to their infancy
and they usually work with one or at the most, a few law firms. Selffiling
is rare, as startups tend to focus more on building their business
rather than in-house legal capability. For example, the following agtech
start-ups work solely with one law firm: Terravion works with Perkins
Coie LLP; Strider Labs works with Kahler Käck Mollekopf, Infarm
GmbH has worked with Reiniger und Partner for their EP and DE
filings; and Centaur Inc is represented by Polsinelli Shugart in the US.
It is quite possible that these startups will increase their patent
filings and then widen their representation options in the future. It’s
also possible that if the start-up doesn’t already have a law firm
representation in your jurisdiction, then perhaps you can grab the
opportunity to be their representing law firm.
As the field of agtech area continues to grow, law firms should weigh
up the time and expenditure they would need to invest to break into
the market of being a preferred law firm for an existing corporate,
against obtaining work from agtech start-ups. Especially, as the
start-up business for your law firm could increase significantly in a
one- to five-year period.
The growth and pace of innovation in this field and the opportunities
to work with many startups certainly makes it a clear case on why
law firms already working in related areas (automotive, high tech and
electronics, automation and robotics) should not overlook the ripe
business development opportunities in agricultural technology. IPPro
Doris Spielthenner, general manager, Practice Insight
46 IPPro The Internet www.ipprotheinternet.com 47