Analysis:
John Deere, which acquired SparkAI in March 2023, was a customer prior to the deal. It used SparkAI’s human-in-the-loop technology on its production-ready, 8R autonomous tractor that uses various sensors to autonomously navigate a farm. One of the main challenges of agricultural autonomy is edge cases. To be viable, autonomous tractors need to perform consistently well even in harsh conditions like dust, rain, snow, and bright sun. These factors can make it difficult for even the best machine learning models to consistently make the right decisions. ​​Without a way to resolve edge cases, robots that could be used in safety-critical functions are forced to stay in R&D mode. With an accurate, confident edge case resolution platform behind their autonomous tractor, John Deere has been able to deploy their product to real farms and get to work addressing some of the biggest problems in agriculture. - Steve Crowe