The AgroTIC Business Chair

The AgroTIC Business Chair

What role for each of us in the digital agriculture of tomorrow? For companies, what positioning should they choose and what new services should they develop to meet their needs? For farmers, what added value can be expected and what confidence can be placed in them? How can we make the most of these new opportunities and integrate them into our operations?
The AgroTIC Chair is a link between the world of research and the economic world
The Montpellier SupAgro and Bordeaux Sciences Agro engineering schools, in collaboration with Irstea, have created the AgroTic Business Chair dedicated to Digital Agriculture. The objective of this think-tank is to strengthen the link between education, research and companies involved in digital agriculture. No less than 23 companies, cooperatives, start-ups and SMEs are partners of this unique chair in France.
Objectives

  • Strengthen the link between training, research and companies
  • To study the uses of digital agriculture, to monitor the sector
  • Study new services and emerging technologies
  • Identify the skills research-companies-students
  • Promote the diffusion of digital technologies for agriculture

Axes & actions
Monitor the digital transition (research, uses and ICT in other sectors)

  • Operate the Observatory of digital agricultural uses to produce an annual qualitative and quantitative report on the adoption and dissemination of digital technologies within all French and, eventually, European agricultural sectors.
  • To carry out an inventory of the training needs of professionals in digital agriculture, across all sectors and professions (farmers, technicians, advisors, etc.).
  • Organize seminars to review the applications and uses of a specific technology in agriculture: state of the art, overview of existing products and services, testimonials.

Explore the potential of emerging technologies

  • Organize and lead the Innov'Agro Challenge to involve students in a dynamic of innovation and creativity by asking them to invent new services for agriculture and/or the environment. During this pedagogical exercise, AgroTIC students work in multidisciplinary teams with students from computer science and business schools. The students and the companies involved benefit from privileged exchanges during this exploration of new technologies.
  • Study the potential of emerging technologies, in terms of new uses or new services. The studies are conducted by the team's engineers with the support of the technical resources of the supporting institutes and technical partners.
  • Mobilize the Project Emergence Fund to quickly implement resources for a new project and thus react in an agile manner according to opportunities and current events.

Identify competencies to establish new collaborations

  • Award the "Digital Agriculture Entrepreneur" grant to support an innovative entrepreneurial project in digital agriculture.
  • Establish a mapping of research actors in Digital Agriculture to facilitate the mutual identification of potential partners
  • Organize collective visits to research laboratories in order to bring together companies and laboratories whose skills may interest them. The Chair's team will identify the laboratories and organize the visits for professionals and students.

Website of the AgroTIC Chair
Contact: Léo Pichon (Montpellier SupAgro)