App helps farmers collect and retrieve data

Ann Arbor

ONE day in 2011, Jesse Vollmar's uncle was complaining about how difficult the family farm's new data management software was to use. Despite taking a course taught by the software provider, he still could not figure out how to get it to keep track of seeding dates, rainfall, field yield or any of the other functions that mattered most.

Mr Vollmar, now 26, thought that he and his partner in a local website design business could do better. Four years later, thousands of farmers worldwide use their app, FarmLogs, to record planting dates, watering schedules and crop yield. In addition, subscribers can receive data from FarmLogs about rainfall and soil health that is tailored to their fields.