Supporting human capital to integrate drone data into business processes

With the support from

ESF

 

Supporting human capital to integrate drone data into business processes

Data collection with drones offers new opportunities for companies in all kinds of sectors that are committed to digital transformation. In the Industry 4.0 Living Labs Smart Farming, Smart Connectivity and Drones in Construction and Agriculture, digital technologies were developed in which drones are used to collect precision data in a more efficient and/or safer way than via existing processes. The target groups are the logistics sector, fruit cultivation and agriculture, and drone companies.

Project goals

The aim of this ESF project is to effectively integrate the developed technology into the business processes with a focus on human capital.  This means that the employees of the companies in the various target groups were actively involved and guided during integration. Guidance paths were drawn up for all employees who play a direct or indirect role in the value chain from data collection and processing to the interpretation and integration of the data into the business processes.

Centered around three use cases

The project centred around three concrete use cases, in different sectors.

Drone inventory

During the guidance process, a study was conducted on the inventory methods used in two industrial companies. Next, the various commercially available inventory solutions on the market were mapped. Finally, Flanders Make, IDEWE and Syntra rolled out an autonomous drone inventory solution in these two logistics environments and examined the impact on human capital and business processes. The conclusions of this work are described in a publicly available white paper and a guide to deploying new technology in the workplace.

Detection of disease in potatoes

At the guidance sessions, the possibilities of drone technology for Alternaria detection were explained to farmers and the pros and cons discussed with them. In addition, pilots were trained to perform drone flights in a qualitative manner and become familiar with the Mapeo Field Software and web application. Furthermore, the companies were supported and advised in interpreting the results.

The pilot projects showed that good communication and planning between farmer and drone pilot was very important. In addition, it could be shown that it was possible to transmit data already a few hours after flying, process it and make the resulting application map available to the end user. However, the models used need further fine-tuning to make the results practical.

Strawberry and pear tree monitoring

In this project, on the one hand, a practical guide was created for fruit growers to get started with drone images. On the other hand, VITO and Syntrum prepared a course and script aimed at drone pilots for performing flights in fruit growing and how to load these images into MAPEO for further image processing.

The guide for fruit growers was realised in collaboration with two pilot fruit farms, where two different applications were evaluated: harvest prediction in strawberry and variable root pruning in pear. The resulting guide is publicly available can be consulted on the pcfruit website. The pilote guides are detailed in MAPEO's help centre

Project partners

Contact

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