In the US, the Starlink option will expand Halter’s addressable market by around 50%, Piggott says.
Starlink will also help with Halter’s pending South American push, Halter says. The reach of Musk’s satellite service – essentially, anywhere with line-of-sight to the sky – has also put Africa on Halter’s radar for the first time.
Today, the Auckland-based, Delaware-incorporated Halter – which recently raised $377 million at a $3.3b valuation – says its collars are on more than one million animals across more than 2000 farms.
What it costs
The Starlink-enabled collars will cost $9 per animal per month, compared to $8 per cow per month for the mast-based system.
Piggot says the Starlink option will work out cheaper for beef cattle because there’s no need for a farmer to spend upfront on infrastructure – essentially, radio masts or towers.
He quotes the option of a giant ranch in the US where some 50 masts have been installed at a cost of around US$100,000.
In a case study rolled out by Halter, Bevan McKnight, lessee of Northburn Station in the Dunstan Mountains, Central Otago, runs 200 Angus cattle and 11,000 merino sheep on 13,000ha, and says direct-to-satellite will unlock unconstrained grazing.
“For the first time, we’ll be able to graze large blocks of land that have never been touched by our cattle, because we had no way of managing them there.
“To do that before this satellite solution would have required 25 towers, so this new practical option makes Halter a no-brainer for us.
“Globally, the average is around three or four [masts].”
He sees the Starlink option appealing to beef farmers, while masts remain more economically appealing for dairy, which typically involves a smaller farm on flatter terrain.
For data efficiency, only a designated “lead cow” needs to communicate with Starlink at any given time. Its smart collar can then share data with other animals in the herd via a mesh network. Every cow is Starlink-connected, to allow for the “lead cow” to rotate as animals move around, and the possibility that two or three will shuffle off to the side.
One NZ tie-up
The New Zealand leg of Halter’s Starlink offering is based on a partnership with One NZ.
Piggott said there was no option to work with Starlink directly. One NZ, Spark and 2degrees are the firm’s official resellers of its business service locally.
“Halter is an example of Kiwi innovation at its absolute best, and we’re stoked to be backing their expansion of rural connectivity with One NZ Satellite for their smart collars,” One NZ chief executive Jason Paris says.
“It’s not every day you’re helping cows connect to satellites in space, so that New Zealand farmers can access world-leading technology.”
What happens if the internet or power goes down?
What happens if Musk’s satellite service suffers an outage? Or, for mast-based farms, the internet, cellular service and/or power goes out?
“Starlink’s very reliable,” Piggott says.
His key point is that Halter’s GPS-enabled, solar-powered smart collars keep operating even if all connectivity and power is lost.
“The collars retain the commands that they have,” Piggott says.
So the animals will keep following the existing virtual fence lines.
If new commands have to be issued – for example, because animals need to be moved out of a flooded area – a phone can be used to connect directly to collars via Bluetooth, even if the solution could be inelegant. The wireless technology only has a range of about 15m, but a “mesh” set-up means one collar can share data with others within close proximity.
New heat-monitoring features
Halter has also launched a suite of new tools today, including fertility detection for beef cattle as part of a Beef Pro subscription (which costs an extra $2 per month). The feature was previously only available for dairy cows.
It’s described as a world-first for a smart collar for beef cattle.
Piggott says it will improve fertility rates via early detection of which cows are non-cycling before breeding season begins. It also rates bull performance.
Beef farmers also get real-time performance data, allowing them to track a cow and its mob’s average rumination, grazing, standing, lying and walking minutes over the past 24 hours, to identify low and high performing stock sooner.
Chris Keall is an Auckland-based member of the Herald’s business team. He joined the Herald in 2018 and is the technology editor and a senior business writer.
