During the 2018 Farm Progress Show in Boone, Iowa, an Iowa-based software company called Smart Ag debuted its AutoCart cloud-based software platform that enables a tractor to drive autonomously.

During a demonstration, a newly autonomous John Deere tractor circled the demonstration field, and paused when a manually operated combine crossed its automated path. 

“The first time that I saw a tractor operating without an operator in it, I just thought, ‘It looks like the Headless Horseman,’” says Smart Ag’s Chief Technology Officer Mark Barglo, via the Business Record.

“When you see that technology working, and you see what you can do with the technology that we have, that’s when you feel like there’s something really big happening.” 

Smart Ag’s AutoCart system directly interfaces over the controls in an existing grain cart tractor. Combine operators use a tablet to set staging and unloading points for the AutoCart system to abide by, and the system calculates the route for the tractor to follow. 

Operators can use their tablet in the combine’s cab to keep track of the AutoCart directions, without having to manage controls over two vehicles at once.

“Our system is not very hard to learn at all,” Barglof says. “It generates a path for you, so you can see where [it] goes. We’ve intended to build it in a way that is as approachable and simple as possible.”  

Barglof adds, “that kind of takes some of the scariness out of the fact that no one’s driving that tractor.” 

Starting this fall, ten partner dealers in the Midwest will start carrying the AutoCart system for sale, at an expected price point between $35,000-$40,000. The system is already available for preorder online. 

“In farming, we’ve had auto-steer for years, we got precision guidance systems right after NASA. But we haven’t had any technology that’s enabled a farmer to leave the cab and have the system operate on its own,” explains Smart Ag founder and CEO Colin Hurd. “That’s what this technology is. It’s a system that you can install on your existing tractor that makes it self-driving, completely operator-less.”

This technology is not a good fit for farmers who want to replace hired workers, Barglof said while taking questions during the demonstration, but it can help farmers who don’t have enough staff to drive grain carts during harvest. 

“We do not intend for that technology to take anyone out of a cab. … I would love for rural America, particularly rural Iowa, to be built up with enough people who can help out on the farm that we wouldn’t need technology like this. But realistically, the decline of the rural population is significant,” Barglof says. “This technology will not climb on top of a pen and fix a broken chain.”