Kubota Corporation (Head Office: Naniwa-ku, Osaka, Japan; President and Representative Director: Yuichi Kitao; hereinafter, “Kubota”), Topcon Corporation (Headquarters: Itabashi-ku, Tokyo, Japan; President and Chief Executive Officer: Satoshi Hirano; Hereinafter: “Topcon”) and Topcon Positioning Systems, Inc. (Head Office: California, US; President & CEO: Raymond O’Connor) have entered into a collaboration research agreement in the field of smart agriculture. Those companies will work together to innovate for future commercialization through collaborative research in the field of smart agriculture, bringing together the technologies and know-how developed by each company.
- Background and Objectives
While global food demand continues to increase and labor shortages at production sites also remain to be a concern, there are also increasing expectations for smart agriculture that aims to improve work efficiency and productivity.
Kubota has continued for many years to supply products and services for agricultural workers around the world while Topcon has been promoting the automation of farm operations through autosteering, crop analysis technologies and digital transformation solutions. Both companies, each having its own technical knowledge, work collaboratively to move forward with research and development into smart agriculture in a wide range of fields including collecting and managing agronomic data that utilizes various sensors, and solutions for productivity improvements through utilizing big data. - Collaborative Research Overview
About Topcon Corporation
With the Corporate Identity of “contribute to enrich human life by solving the societal challenges within healthcare, agriculture and infrastructure,” in the Agriculture domain, Topcon promotes the factorization of agriculture by attaining higher precision and improved productivity from planning to harvest, which is the agricultural cycle. They will attain this through digital tarnsformation solutions that include automation of farm operations and utilization of IT in order to meet the worldwide demand for food.
About Topcon positioning Systems, Inc.
With Topcon Positioning Systems, always one step ahead in technology and customer benefits, is an industry leading designer, manufacturer and distributor of precision measurement and workflow solutions for the global construction, geospatial and agriculture markets. Topcon Positioning Group is headquartered in Livermore, California, U.S. Its European head office is in Capelle a/d IJssel, the Netherlands.
About Kubota
Kubota has been a leading manufacturer of agricultural, turf and construction equipment and Industrial Engines since 1890. With world Headquarters in Osaka Japan, and offices in more than 120 countries, and with over 41,000 employees throughout North America, Europe and Asia, Kubota achieved revenues in 2020 of $17.3 billion. Although agricultural equipment is Kubota’s primary line of products, Kubota also produces a diverse portfolio of other products including city wide water filtration systems, irrigation, piping, roofing, housing and large underground valves.
