Bayer is entering into a strategic partnership with Microsoft to build a new cloud-based set of digital tools and data science solutions for the agricultural and adjacent industries, bringing new infrastructure and foundational capabilities to accelerate innovation, boost efficiency, and support sustainability across value chains.
"Agriculture and agribusinesses today benefit from a wide range of digital tools and data-powered insights through platforms like our Climate FieldView – used today on more than 180 million farming acres across more than 20 countries. Still, there is work to do to optimize the entire food, feed, fuel, and fiber value chain and its use of the precious natural resources required to power the planet while ensuring broader efforts to combat climate change," the Bayer team stated. "Under the agreement, we will work with Microsoft to co-develop new solutions that address critical industry scenarios such as farming operations, sustainable sourcing, manufacturing and supply chain improvement, and ESG monitoring and measurement."
The companies aim to do this by developing the go-forward infrastructure for digital farming solutions and data science capabilities. These new solutions and capabilities will be available to businesses – from startups to global enterprises – in agriculture and adjacent industries for use in their own offerings. "We will also migrate its digital farming core capabilities to the new infrastructure for its own customer-facing solutions." the Bayer team continues.
“This partnership comes at a unique point in time, where increased innovation is sorely needed across the food and fiber value chain,” said Liam Condon, Member of the Board of Management of Bayer AG and President of Bayer Crop Science. “As we cope with an ongoing global pandemic, fragile supply chains, and the continuing climate catastrophe, status quo will not suffice. We need collaboration, shared vision, and action. For those reasons, Bayer and Microsoft are taking action to make a positive impact, both through our own collaboration as well as by offering off-the-shelf infrastructure and digital capabilities for other companies to address the enormous challenges facing our society.”
“As agriculture and technology entrepreneurs and organizations work to advance the security and sustainability of the value chain – supporting farmers at its foundation – collaboration is required,” said Jeremy Williams, Head of The Climate Corporation and Bayer Digital Farming Solutions.
“Like every industry, farming and the food sector are undergoing rapid digital transformation, from autonomous tractors to AI-based digital advisories and scalable precision agriculture,” said Ravi Krishnaswamy, Corporate Vice President, Azure Global Industry at Microsoft. “We’re excited to partner with Bayer to accelerate this transformation by bringing together data-driven insights with Bayer’s agronomic expertise and the power of Microsoft Azure.”
"This partnership is a strategic step forward in accomplishing Bayer’s target of 100-percent digitally enabled sales in the Crop Science division by 2030 and accelerating its ability to deliver outcomes-based, digitally enabled solutions to customers," the team concludes.
Bayer