Boost precision agriculture with machinery automation, SIMCom GNSS positioning solutions lead the way

For?a?long?time, agriculture?machinery?greatly relies?on manual operation, which is labor-intensive and requires high manipulation skills. However, in today's agricultural practices, large areas of farmland require higher precision in cultivation, such as seeding, ditching, mulching, ridging, intertilling, and pesticide application, all of which require highly?straight-line operation,?which manual labor cannot guarantee the?precision and efficiency. Therefore, agriculture machinery urgently needs to upgrade?its level of automation.

In the process of automation?of agricultural machinery, GNSS plays a fundamental role. Automated agriculture machinery?can free up labor, extend effective working hours, improve the quality and efficiency, and increase land utilization.

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Agriculture Drone

Based?on?high-precision GNSS positioning,?together with the GIS?(Geographic Information System),?the IMU?(Inertial Measurement Unit) and other sensors like height measurement,?the agriculture?drone can achieve completely autonomous flight along setting trajectories for pesticide, fertilizer, and seed spraying，reducing the rate of overlapping and?omissions. What’s more, It also can be used to monitor the health and growth of crops with infrared?cameras?to indicate which field areas require attention according to light absorption rate. Comparing with farmers walking into the farmland to do filed inspection or setting up a monitoring station, the agriculture drone can greatly improve the efficiency for its better and larger view, which is suitable for a variety of crops,?fruit trees?cultivation and even livestock inspection.

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Auto-Steering of Agriculture Machinery

As the core technology of agricultural machinery autonomous driving, GNSS utilizes positioning technology to obtain real-time location and operating scenarios of agricultural machinery, combining algorithms such as RTK?(Real Time Kinematics),?to?achieve precise positioning. At the same time, data?collected by sensors?are?also used to obtain information on the attitude of the agricultural machinery. By comparing?both the GNSS and sensor data?with the?setting?value, the auto-steering system?allows for real-time adjustments to the working mode and status of the agriculture?machinery, enabling high-precision, efficient, and intelligently?autonomous driving of agriculture?machinery.

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The Benefits of Agriculture Machinery Automation

The?precision agriculture brought by?agricultural machinery automation can improve the utilization of farmland and machinery equipment?while?reducing?the labor intensity and?bringing down?skill requirements for?workers.?The auto-steering machinery barely needs operators’?ceaseless attention, which could not?be?affected by weather conditions, making it easy to work at night or in foggy conditions, effectively extending the cultivable time and improving efficiency in the?busiest?seasons?of planting and harvesting.

On top of that, Precise cultivation?results in better?fertilization and high-quality soil conditions providing favorable growing environments for crops. Farm automation?can also reduce?the ecological footprint by using water more efficiently and precisely control?the amount of pesticides and fertilizer?applied. Furthermore,?high-precision linear planting also lays a good foundation for subsequent intertillage, largely reducing damage and waste caused by machinery.

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What can SIMCom offer?

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There are a wide range of positioning modules available in SIMCom’s product portfolio, including various levels of GNSS products that can meet different needs in agricultural automation. The GNSS modules that support standard precision positioning working on a single frequency or dual frequencies, such as SIM65M and SIM68D, are able to achieve the precision of 1.5-2 meters. And the high-precision modules with capabilities such as RTK?(Real Time Kinematics), and DR?(Dead Reckoning) offers higher precision, usually within 1.5 meters, even to a degree of millimeters.

To better accommodate to the farming applications, SIMCom has strengthened the robustness and performances of its GNSS modules in every possible way. The ability of SIMCom GNSS modules to receive signals from multiple constellations and support SABS ranging, along with high-precision positioning navigation engine and high sensitivity can bring immediate positioning capabilities for various agricultural machinery. With the assistance of advanced AGPS, jamming removing technology and built-in low-noise amplifier, the powerful anti-interference ability and robust hardware design can ensure them to meet the requirements of working in complicated outdoor environments. In addition, with complete certifications,?customer terminals adopt SIMCom modules can quickly enter target markets.

Agriculture is the primal foundation of human society. And?its?automation is a necessary path to improve productivity and efficiency. SIMCom?has long been committed to smart agriculture and has accumulated a wealth of experience in agricultural IoT projects, using wireless connectivity to actively help?farmers establish smarter facilities and to drive the digital transformation of the oldest industry, effectively coping with the global challenges such as food security, shortages of farm labor and climate changes.