HSENS

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Company info:

Name: Encore Lab SL
Date founded: 2010
Number of employees: 10
Location: Logrono, Spain

Encore Lab is a technology-based company whose main objective is the development of innovative solutions in three technical areas: development of electronic devices, advanced software and data analysis via data mining.

www.encore-lab.com

Partners:

Innovation Management Partner:

New low consumption and autonomous soil humidity sensor with fast deployment

Challenge

Water is a key resource for agriculture both for the economic and environmental sustainability. The volume of water used for irrigation per year in EU-28 is 39.8 billion m3. However, effective irrigation is only 35% of this amount.

Irrigation of crops is usually applied based on a fixed schedule or even on the farmers intuition. Despite technologies such as soil moisture sensors are available in the market to help farmers make better decisions on water management, there is a poor market penetration for these technologies

Solution

ENCORE aimed to design a low cost Cyber-Physical-System that will integrate sensing, logging and remote communication functionalities. Using the latest low consumption IoT technologies such as Ultranarrow Band protocols and the new generation of low power microprocessors STM32-L0.

Achievements

ENCORE LAB have designed and prototyped device able to measure soil humidity at different depths attached to an autonomous plug and play communication module able to send real time data to agronomic platform Cesens®. The device installation does not require specialized staff or tools and it is based on DIY concept.

Impact

Agriculture is the largest single user of fresh water, accounting for ∼75% of current human water use. Globally, in both irrigated and rain fed agriculture only about 10–30% of the available water (as rainfall, surface or groundwater) is used by plants as transpiration, being even a lower figure (5%) in arid areas.

In this context, improving water use efficiency in agriculture could not only make a better use of this scarce resource but also reduce the energy consumption derived of the use of pumps and other devices involved in irrigation. Soil moisture monitoring is the more direct method to assess the real need for irrigation in agriculture.

HSENS proposes a new technology that will significantly contribute to these goals, allowing to reduce the consumption both of water and energy by more than 30% in agriculture. Thus, only in Europe the new system would allow to save almost 12 billion m3 of water per year.

Video

HYPEMLIFE

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Company info:

Name: GENPORT srl
Date founded: 2009
Location: Vimercate (IT), Commerce (US)

Genport srl makes advanced hybrid power sources for extreme environments suitable in residential, emergency, telecommunication, agriculture, electro-medical, industrial applications.

www.genport.it

Partners:

Innovation Management Partner:

Predictive Control System to Maximize Lifetime of Hybrid Fuel Cells

Challenge

The vast majorities of today’s Battery Management Systems (BMS) for commercial lithium ion battery modules are based on empirical models of the lithium ion cell. Their prediction capabilities are limited and they cannot be used to estimate the State of Health (SOH), the Remaining Useful Life (RUL) and the Aging of the cells.

The main challenge to reduce the total cost of ownership concerns an optimized management of electrochemical power sources through adaptive control strategies and prognostic capabilities.

Solution

Genport designs and realizes hybrid fuel cells (HFC) combining smart energy storage systems based on Li-ion batteries with Proton Exchange Membrane (PEM) fuel cells. In order to improve reliability and lifetime, Genport has developed an algorithm capable to predict internal states (SOH, RUL) of lithium ion batteries based on their electro-chemical model (ECM).

Within HYPEMLIFE, Genport has embedded a reduced order version of the original ECM into the STM32 high-end board.

The STM32 communicates with the Li-ion battery and PEM fuel cell and will read actual voltage, current and temperature values for the battery; from those variables, HIPEMLIFE algorithm continuously detects the internal states of the hybrid power source.

FED4SAE Support

HYPEMLIFE has been implemented on the ST Microelectronics processor STM32 family and it has been validated on Genport’s 7kW HFC system at the Energy Electronic Testbed of Fraunhofer IISB.

Impact

HYPEMLIFE prognostics capabilities has minimized the overall cost of energy and improved the power quality of hybrid power sources while matching uncertainty of renewable energy sources with variability of load profile.

Integrated inside a BMS the prognostic tool provide high precision real time estimations of important internal states of the battery. It also adds diagnostic capabilities embedded inside a battery tester by identifying latent faults in the cells.

The collaboration with ST Microelectronics and Fraunhofer Institute is moving Genport to the forefront in the design of advanced electronic & control solutions to provide better power solutions to the cleantech industry

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Video

HyperCook

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Company info:

Name: GreenTropism
Date founded: 2014
Number of employees: 12
Location: Paris, France

Greentropism provides application-driven tools and expertise for deployment of smart spectroscopy for industrials and/or consumers.

http://www.greentropism.com/

Partners:

Innovation Management Partner:

HyperCook: AI multispectral imaging for smart online monitoring of baking process

Challenge & Solution

The baking industry is one of Europe’s earliest industries however modern baking industry faces challenges of achieving increasing efficiency, reducing waste while ensuring a high quality product is delivered in a timely, consistent matter to their customers.

HyperCook aims to bring the insights provided by exploiting CSEM’s Hyperspectal camera along with their domain expertise in Hyperspectral imaging systems to the industrial baking process to gain additional insights into the cooking process and enable smarter industrial baking ovens to consistently produce the perfect high quality product.

By combining multispectral imaging with relevant and robust algorithms, Hypercook will be able to monitor the biscuit baking process in a static or moving scene configuration. The solution may be later fully integrated and offer communication with the oven assuring a complete autonomous functioning as part of an integrated bakery management system.

A main challenge to address is the products variability, even within one type as biscuits (relief, shape, impact of the recipe, marking, etc), and also user-experience driven quality experience (visual, taste, texture). Well adapted data treatment and machine learning tools developed by GreenTropism are key to address these challenges and provide a data driven decision-making system.

Solution

Greentropism aim to develop a prototype that combines hardware, software and hyperspectral imaging components along with their domain knowledge expertise, to provide an integrated system to monitor and control the cooking process. Such a system may be installed inline in the baking process and enable real-time feedback control of the cooking process. The system will provide information at different levels : from the user perspective, it will automate the determination of cooking stage by applying embedded machine learning algorithms ; later on, for an even smarter integration, it can be further interconnected with industrial ovens, in order to adapt the protocol (time, temperature, humidity, speed of the conveyor belt etc.) as part of the perfect recipe.

FED4SAE Support

Greentropism is specialized in spectroscopy data analysis and machine learning’s which neatly compliments CSEM’s capacities and expertise in multispectral imaging and product integration. Intel provides the Compute platforms (IPC) to enable the secure integration of the various components as part of an integrated baking or manufacturing process. Insights in innovation management were contributed by Blumorpho which is important for product development as well as to consider the right business models and market approaches.

Impact

Machine learning applied to multispectral camera offers a wide range of potential applications in food & beverage as well as in health, cosmetics, agriculture etc. For example, after developing its expertise on biscuit baking levels, Greentropism will be able to extend applications to pastry, rotisserie, precooked frozen food processing etc. Developing those CPS is beneficial to the market as it allows a more dynamic, cost reducing and homogeneous production. Hypercook is leading the way in ensuring quality and consistently of our food while delivering a greener industry with reduced waste and energy consumption.

IDRD

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Company info:

Name: Ubotica Technologies Ltd.
Date founded: 2016
Number of employees: 12
Location: Dublin, Ireland; Ciudad Real, Spain

Irish SME focused on delivering computer vision and AI based solutions on-the-edge.

www.ubotica.com

Partners:

Innovation Management Partner:

IDRD: In-Line Diabetic Retinopathy Detection

Challenge

Diabetic Retinopathy (DR) is the leading cause of vision loss in adults aged between 25 and 60, with a recent study estimating that the number of people worldwide with DR will grow to 191 million by 2030. When DR is caught early, treatment is effective at reducing or preventing vision loss. Only a very small number of countries have national screening programmes for DR detection in place, and they are costly to run.

Solution

Ubotica has developed a deep-learning based solution for detecting the presence of DR indicators in retinal images on-the-edge, in the specialist fundus cameras that take these images. The solution has been designed to assist ophthalmologists to accurately and consistently evaluate and diagnose DR. To support this, it also provides information related to the basis on which the assessment was made.

Achievements

A light weight solution has been developed around the embeddable Intel Movidius Myriad X Vision Processing Unit (VPU), which pre-processes the retinal images using its on-board image filtering capabilities and then applies an Artificial Intelligence Convolutional Neural Network (CNN) to assess the retinal image for DR indicators. Runtime analysis with the Neural Network Dependability Kit (NNDK) is applied to display to the user the CNN training images which most closely match the image being analysed. This introduces a level of confidence to In-Line Diabetic Retinopathy Detection that heretofore was not possible, adding a Verifiable AI element. The integration of the working prototype with a retinal imaging camera has been demonstrated.

FED4SAE Support

A significant challenge in the deployment of AI based solutions is in the supervising of decisions of the CNNs which are at the core of these systems. Addressing this, fortiss supported in interpreting the NNDK metrics for assessing the performance of the CNN, also after a vigorous pruning process to reduce the model’s size and make inference faster, and in integrating the runtime analysis into the application. Depending on their specialization, all FED4SAE partners provided input to refine the technical approach and business case, and joint dissemination opportunities were exploited.

Impact

Ubotica are working with fundus camera manufacturers to introduce the solution to the marketplace, offering customization and design-in services for the VPU, CNN and associated software. The NNDK’s supervisory role on the decisions being made by the CNNs delivers a significant benefit to solution integrators. Deploying Ubotica’s solution in fundus cameras will significantly enhance the role of both the cameras and the ophthalmologists who use the cameras, with further advances anticipated with the introduction of detectors for other pathologies, such as Glaucoma and Hypertension, all based on the same underlying hardware.

Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlCkOZ8aK_Y

Immersive4Learning

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Company info:

Name: AR/VR Tech
Date founded: 2010
Number of employees: 5
Location: Serbia

www.arvrtech.eu

Partners:

Innovation Management Partner:

VR Based learning for the future

Challenge

This innovative platform addresses problems of old teaching methods and shortcomings of modern VR learning platforms related to knowledge retention, learning and teaching efficiency, complex creation of VR and educational content, scalability and costly production of current VR learning solutions.

Solution

Immersive4Learning is an innovative intelligent platform, powered by artificial intelligence (AI) and pedagogical and cognitive models for creation and delivery of teaching material in the Virtual Reality environments. Immersive4Learning utilize a set of pedagogical models, and behaviour, learning style and cognitive performance monitoring engine, enabling dynamic personalization of the learning experience. It is a virtual-reality-based, personalization-focused tool for creation of VR applications for enterprise training and education sectors.

Through monitoring relevant data (behavior, EEG, skill understanding, and more), you can keep track of how well the students understand their curriculum.

Immersive4Learning offers personalized learning experiences for each student. It effectively enables one-on-one tutoring. The platform monitors the student’s results and engagement levels, modifying the learning strategies accordingly.

  • Integrating more intelligence in the authoring process
  • Developing new domain language for Virtual Reality Learning Environment (VRLE)
  • Integrating biometric data into personalization
  • Developing new continuous learning AI algorithms, constantly updating
  • Devising new pedagogical strategies for VRLE

FED4SAE Support

During the project Intel have supported ARVR Tech with technical and design related aspects in regards to the Intel ComputeStick. KTH have provided a couple of sessions and workshop on the OSLC standard. The solution now have prepared integration interfaces based on the standard that could be utilized in future industry cases.

BlueMorpho have offered a number meetings to help ARVR Tech with their Business Plan and Go to Market strategies. BlueMorpho have also invited ARVR Tech to a number of matchmaking and investor events.

Impact

Initially two major domains have been identified for the go to market strategy, namely formal education and industrial training. This are two domains were the digitalization effort in the EU need to be strengthened and the IMMERSIVE4LEARNING platform will be a important contribution. The plan accounts for major events in these areas as well as commercial activities with the relevant stakeholders.

Videos

INCOMING

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Company info:

Name: Zannini S.p.A.
Date founded: 1963
Number of employees: 150
Location: Castelfidardo (AN), Italy

Zannini is specialized in the production of high precision machined components for automotive applications.

www.zannini.com

Partners:

Innovation Management Partner:

INCOMING: smart Interface for COnnected MachinING operation

Challenge

Even in highly automated factories, gathering data from the many machines in order to be able to analyze and optimize the production process is not straightforward. Also, automating individual processes is one thing, but making systems interact and play together like a well-tuned orchestra is another challenge. Processes and equipment are diverse, so integration must be highly individualized. Conventional programming approaches are often too time consuming. Legacy equipment may not even have digital networking capabilities.

Solution

The INCOMING system is a new solution to integrate industrial manufacturing equipment of all kinds and generations for data acquisition and high-level control. It is designed to be easily set-up, scaled and modified, thanks to its open architecture. INCOMING allows machine operators and production managers to monitor and control status and parameter data from machines and bridges islands of automation to make production more efficient. The platform does not require high investments up-front and can grow with the needs of the customer.

Achievements

A device for integrating machines into the INCOMING system (DACB: Data Acquisition and Control Box) has been developed that is installed in or close to the machine, communicating with it and with retrofit sensors via industry-standard discrete signals or OPC UA.

Following open Internet of Things communication protocols, the DACBs exchange data with the INCOMING central server that hosts the operational data dashboards for the machines and provides a connection with other manufacturing IT systems

For validation, the system was deployed to three turning machines with three different generations of machine control technologies in Zannini’s Castelfidardo plant. Collecting status data and interlinking the machines with a smart material handling system, it has enabled a significant increase of their overall equipment efficiency (OEE).

FED4SAE Support

The cost-efficient DACB design prototype is based on the STM32MP1 hardware platform and OpenSTLinux operating system, for which STMicroelectronics provided technical support. The DACB’s application logic is built on the IEC 61499 compliant Eclipse 4diac platform for distributed industrial automation and control software, which fortiss ported to the STMicroelectronics runtime target and extended to meet the scenario’s requirements. Blumorpho provided business innovation related coaching.

Impact

Following the successful first deployment, the rollout of the INCOMING system will be continued at Zannini’s domestic and international sites wherever it can improve the efficiency of manufacturing processes and help gather valuable data faster. In addition, it forms the basis for a potential future product to be offered to external customers and supported through Zannini’s spin-off Z4tec, enabling them to monitor and optimize their own manufacturing processes.

Video

https://youtu.be/S6bDKRcytRc

IoT SG

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Company info:

Name: IoT Solutions Group
Date founded: 2018
Number of employees: 8
Location: Watford and Bournemouth, UK

www.iotsg.co.uk

Partners:

Innovation Management Partner:

Driving efficiency and impact through real-time insight

Sensing solutions for 2020 and Beyond

Challenge

As technology advances and lifestyles change, consumer expectations increase. Financial pressures on local authorities and private enterprises continue to rise and the need to improve services to match growing expectations is ever-present.

Trials of IoT devices in the waste management industry indicate significant opportunities for savings of at least 35%. Some research has indicated that up to 87% of public bin collections are wasted, due to low fill rates. Incidents of fires in public bins have resulted in the need for one English council to replace two waste collection vehicles at a cost of £500k.

Traditional methods of delivering fundamental services struggle to provide continuous improvement and new ways must be sought. The potential benefits are clear and sizeable.

Solution

IoT Solutions Group has developed an end to end value chain, comprising sensing devices, edge processing and data dissemination.

We are working to combat the inefficiencies experienced across the waste management industry, improve environmental standards and eliminate instances of asset destruction.

Our devices detect the fill rate of bins, if they have been left open, overturned and potential incidents of fire. By tying up with multiple LPWAN solutions we are able to support the technological requirements of any local authority or waste management company and convert data to usable insight in real-time.

FED4SAE Support

With the support of FED4SAE and by working with Digital Catapult and STMicroelectronics our solution is utilising:

  • STM32F hardware platform
  • LPWAN platform supported by Digital Catapult – deploying SIGFOX and LoRaWAN connectivity

The FED4SAE support has enabled us to accelerate our sensor development and improved the effectiveness of our end to end solutions. The partnership has undoubtedly opened new doors and helped advance our reach into the market.

Impact

Our integrated waste management solutions provide local authorities and waste management operatives with the information they need to streamline collection services, enable emergency response and prevent high value asset write off.

Financial savings and opportunity cost benefits promise to be significant, whilst also enhancing local environments for residents and visitors.

By covering the full value chain, from hardware to insight, and designing bespoke solutions, we are able to provide clients with the insight they need, in the way they need it to address their priorities.

This approach also eliminates end users’ needs to procure the constituent parts of the chain separately, thus driving down the cost to deploy and maintain.

Achievements

Validated 3 communication technologies: Sigfox, LoraWAN and NB IoT.

Demonstrated savings > 50 % related to dynamically optimising bin collection and avoiding full bin events.

Obtained order from the UK’s market leading waste management company.

MAMMUT

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Company info:

Name: Energica Motor Company SPA
Date founded: 2014
Number of employees:40
Location: Via Scarlatti 20 -41019 Soliera (MO), Italy

Energica Motor is the first Italian manufacturer of super sport electric motorcycles. Energica electric motorcycles are the ultimate expression of Italian luxury, masterfully manufactured in the Italian Motor Valley in Modena, Italy.

www.energicamotor.com

Partners:

Innovation Management Partner:

MAMMUT

Supporting the development of a LoRa based connectivity solution for remote battery status monitoring and reporting

Challenge

Smart connectivity represents both a challenge and a huge market opportunity in the transportation sector, resulting in an increasing number of services, starting from ADAS and ITS that have been developed in the last two decades. In this context, MAMMUT (Monitoring Applications exploiting on-board Motorbike’s MUltiple Transceivers) objective is to implement a novel connectivity architecture with regards to electric two-wheelers, with the aim of increasing the service offer within the whole value chain of electric motorbikes, starting from vehicle to the riders.

Solution

MAMMUT looks to provide electric two wheelers with a whole connectivity range solution, maximizing the monitoring range in inactive periods while reducing operating costs of connectivity through inexpensive LoRa™ connectivity, while enabling data-intensive modules for dedicated applications and active riding times where vehicle’s main battery is enabled so as to increase the services related to V2X connectivity. Thanks to MAMMUT, Energica aims to provide:

  • Component and vehicle status tracking at idle times.
  • Plug-n-play device to support both isolated battery monitoring or vehicle monitoring to avoid that motorbikes/batteries are not charged during long period of time.
  • Battery/Vehicle monitoring system during transportation and/or long-term storage.
  • Support remote command requests to provide more control and flexibility.
  • Full integration of this service in the official Energica Motor Suite software (used also by our dealers network) for ease of use and fast diagnosis of critical vehicle situations by our Service and Development teams.
  • Massive Data Analysis on the recording to better understand the battery behaviour in a long term – real world usage.

FED4SAE Support

MAMMUT aims to roll out at low ROI the world-wide connectivity of motorbikes with the CMS of Modena performing an AE that enables the realization and validation of a low-cost and high-frequency monitoring applications for stationary vehicles (key-off status). To achieve this goal, among all the different technologies available in the FED4SAE project, MAMMUT will leverage on:

  • one industrial platform with add-on communication modules, the last STM32 platform announced by STMicroelectronics,
  • one testbed, the LoRa™ network of London supported by Digital Catapult, and
  • LoRa geo-localization technology provided by CSEM.

Impact

Developing and validating this type of connectivity board using LoRa has improved the safety during the charging section and during the night (vehicles with key off) inside the paddock of FIM MotoE™ World Cup. Thanks to the introduction of the connectivity Board, Energica has improved the safety and sold the connectivity board to racing teams.

In the future this connectivity board will be integrated in the commercial line of motorbikes to offer a wide range of applications and services.

Thanks to MAMMUT, Energica has developed a proof of concept for a market-ready product and a commercial plan. The demonstration has taken place in a real environment such as the LoRaWAN network across Greater London, as well as FIM MotoE™ World Cup.

Thanks to further introductions by Digital Catapult, and Blumorpho, Energica has had conversations with many more potential investors and partners, giving them access to a huge network of large and small businesses.

Video

NanoLeak

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Company info:

Name: NanoTech Analysis S.r.l
Date founded: 2013
Number of employees: 4
Location: Turin

Operating in the field of fluid and chemical analysis measurements. Company’s vision is to laid the ground for instruments operating at molecular (nano)‐scale.

Nanotechanalysis.com

Partners:

Innovation Management Partner:

Development of a smart sampling device based on NANOhole LEAKs for analytical instrumentation

Challenge

To miniaturize and to digitalize the gas sampling using combination of Nano Electro Mechanichal System (NEMS) and computing power that will lead to high resolution gas analyzer, multigas detectors, innovative GC-MS portable with electronic control and management signal that can be fully integrated on a chip structure.

Solution

The solution is based on an advanced fabrication technology that uses e-beam or stepper patterning to create the pores and then reduces the pore size in a controlled fashion. The pores an be closed off by a current-carrying beam, placed in a strong magnetic field, that moves driven by the Lorentz force.

FED4SAE Support

The NEMS device has been fabricated using CSEM advanced manufacturing/packaging technology platform: an array of submicronic hole is etched in a membrane and flexible beams are created to be able to close each hole individually.

Managing the gas flow is done by controlling currents applied on the beam array, using the STM32 platform. This resulted in realizing and implementing a complete smart management of the inlet gas flows’ control as a function of the sensor signal.

Blumorpho is supporting NanoTech Analysis in building business.

Impact

Gas analysis systems based on the membranes with the small pores are now available but the valves have, however, not demonstrated yet their ability to control the gas flow. Two analysis systems are available and are in almost continuous operation to demonstrate the abilities of the equipment to interested parties.

Simultaneously NanoTech Analysis has been able to build strong partnerships with two important Italian medical research institutions for the launch of two different programs aimed at detecting markers and signatures of specific diseases. The final scope is to realize an innovative scientific instrument able to join the compactness, mobility and high sensitivity resulting from the combination of nano and micro devices defined in the context of this program with more standard analytical techniques.

Video

OPTILIGHT

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Company info:

Name: ALITEC SRL
Date founded: 2006
Number of employees: 12
Location: Pisa, Italy

R&D company devoted to the development of environmental technologies and solutions.

http://www.alitec.eu
http://www.sunto.technology

Partners:

Innovation Management Partner:

Real-time, automated light type monitoring and optimal control in horticulture

Challenge

Despite the scientifically proven relevance of diffuse sunlight for crop production improvement, commercial light sensing technologies do not allow to effectively and affordably implement an automated control of shadings systems in horticultural practices. For this reason, the shading process is not optimized, and so is the production.

Solution

To fill this gap, we have integrated a cyber-physical system gathering real-time information about the type of sunlight available in greenhouses under continuously changing irradiation conditions, and providing input for controlling shading screens so as to optimize crop growth.

The system represents an innovation for it makes available, affordable, and easy to implement in commercial precision horticulture the real-time monitoring of sunlight type available to crops. Such a step-forward in the proposed application domain is enabled by a key component of the OptiLight system: the CIS sensor, a breakthrough device capable of performing a full irradiation assessment broken into all components (direct and diffuse) of sunlight.

Achievements

The results obtained and the tests carried out also during the OptiLight project have allowed us to quickly develop two new products that we will launch on the market in the first semester of 2021: Capt2Go, a low cost and handy solar sensor that measures global, direct, and diffuse irradiation with no need for sun tracking systems or moving parts, and WDS, a compact sun-fueled platform providing power, communication and networking capabilities to environmental monitoring sensors and technologies.

FED4SAE Support

The OptiLight system features the STM32 microcontrollers’ technology, and has tested by the BME team in its VRT facilities.

The financial backing, enabling technologies, and innovation management support ensured by the Fed4SAE consortium have helped to integrate, test and validate the system in real environment, thus paving the way to the commercial exploitation of advanced light control in the target market sector.

Impact

The successful implementation of the OptiLight project has allowed to accelerate the launch to market of an affordable solution enabling the automated light type control, thus responding to the challenge of highly efficient horticultural management. practices.

At innovation level we have increased the CIS sensor’s TRL with respect to its application in the precision horticultural domain, while widening Alitec’s technology portfolio with a ready-to-integrate solution demonstrated in operational environment.

Other achievements

Capt2Go
Wireless Docking Station

Video