Every company has different goals for the app they create, but they also all have one goal in common: attracting a large user base that uses their app frequently. In data-intensive industries like agriculture, this often comes down to one crucial factor: providing consistency in farm data retrieved from various sources and delivered across multiple apps that growers, consultants, and retailers can rely on when making important decisions. This enables users to unlock more value from the data they already own, and combine data layers from different sources to gain new insights.
I speak to product and technology leaders on a daily basis and, without exception, they tell me that the ‘data interoperability’ aspect of building an app is the most expensive and difficult part to build and maintain. From creating and maintaining connections to the individual data sources and converting all different file formats into a standard format, to creating a user experience that simplifies all interactions with data from different sources; all of these take an enormous amount of time and financial investment to develop. With most development projects on a tight budget and hard deadlines for commercial launch, the challenge is obvious.
When we launched Leaf Connect and Leaf Link earlier this year we knew that these new Leaf services would be highly regarded by our clients, and it’s amazing to see how impactful they have been already in just the last few months. Instead of just ‘using Leaf’s API’, an increasing number of companies are now building apps based on Leaf’s infrastructure and the capacity to quickly create the most critical parts of any app: the data infrastructure and its ability to connect to any other data source within food and agriculture.
While app developers have long been able to rapidly connect with equipment manufacturers such as John Deere, Case, and Trimble through Leaf, Leaf Link now offers an out-of-the box user authentication widget for these and other manufacturers, saving developers a lot of time. Leaf Link also offers app developers an out-of-the-box file upload widget that makes it quick and easy for app users to upload farm data. Both Links are now proving to be critical for developers to get their app out there rapidly and in the hands of users. Seeing our clients successfully launch new apps and additional features months ahead of schedule and turning their focus back to what they do best - developing new and innovative features for their users - is so rewarding to see!
Leaf Connect is another service that saves our clients a lot more time than I had expected: I knew that being able to seamlessly transfer data between any Leaf-connected company would be very popular, but I had no idea that this would form such a key part of strategic partnerships. Achieving automatic data-interoperability between businesses by connecting through Leaf is already resulting in increased confidence in data at the user level.
Not having to re-process raw data but instead working with data that another business already processed, and not having to ask app users to gather data from a number of different sources or manually upload this data again; being able to share data in a consistent format through Leaf Connect has a lot of benefits for app developers and their users alike.
To put it in the words of one of our clients: “It’s now a lot quicker for me to create the app that we need and, most importantly, it makes it easy for our grower-clients (who will be using the app) to get more value out of the farm data they already own.”
Whichever goal you’re targeting within the agricultural sector: water conservation, feeding a growing population, achieving net zero, differentiating your crop insurance offering, a combination of these, or any other goals you might have: we’re proud of the role we play in helping app developers be successful! Curious to learn more? I look forward to hearing from you.
