WASHINGTON, Nov. 3, 2015 – Deere & Co. has agreed to buy Monsanto’s Precision Planting LLC for undisclosed terms, the companies said today in a statement.
The deal will enable real-time connectivity between certain Deere farm equipment and the FieldView platform developed by Monsanto’s Climate Corp., allowing what the companies call the “industry’s first and only near real-time in-cab wireless connection” to John Deer equipment by a third party.
“To maximize the value of digital agriculture, farmers need solutions for simple and seamless collection of in-field agronomic data," Mike Stern, president and chief operating officer for Climate Corp., said in a statement. "As a result of these milestone agreements, farmers will experience the fastest, most frequent and highest resolution third-party connectivity between John Deere's equipment and the Climate FieldView platform.”
John May, chief information officer at Deere, the world’s biggest maker of agricultural machinery, said the agreements “allow the company to extend the range of retrofit options available from Precision Planting to many more products and into new geographies.”
Under the terms of the agreements, Moline, Illinois-based Deere will purchase Precision Planting while Climate Corp. will retain the digital agriculture portfolio that has been integrated into the Climate FieldView platform. The acquisition is subject to customary closing conditions, including the approval of the relevant antitrust authorities.
The companies said customers will have the option to share their current and historical agronomic data between the John Deere Operations Center and the Climate FieldView platform and seamlessly execute agronomic prescriptions with John Deere equipment.
Climate Corp. says its FieldView platform combines local weather monitoring, agronomic modeling, and high-resolution weather simulations to deliver online and mobile solutions that help farmers improve profitability by making better informed operating decisions.
Deere has made two other precision agricultural acquisitions in the past month. On Monday, Deere said it had agreed to acquire Monosem, the European market leader in precision planters. The deal includes the company's four facilities in France and two in the United States. The Moline, Illinois-based firm says the acquisition helps accelerate its market reach in precision planting equipment and adds engineering expertise to further develop planting technology.
Last month, Deere agreed to form SageInsights, a joint venture to further develop a cloud software platform called MyAgCentral developed by DN2K for agricultural retailers and other consultants.
#30
For more news, go to: www.Agri-Pulse.com
