Two local businesses have taken the top awards in UCD’s inaugural AgTech accelerator programme.
Abbeyfeale’s Cotter Agritech was named the AIB and Yield Lab AgTech Start-up 2022 and received €10,000, and Causeway-based ProvEye was named the Ornua Most Innovative AgTech Start-up 2022 and also received €10,000.
They both completed the AgTechUCD Agccelerator Programme, which included dedicated business development workshops and investor readiness training, mentoring from experts and business advisors, and facilitated introductions to AgTechUCD’s venture capital and business angel networks.
Cotter Agritech was founded by brothers Jack and Nick Cotter, and has developed a system that enables livestock farmers move from blanket treating animals with antiparasitic drugs, to a very precise application by identifying and targeting only the animals that need treatment.
ProvEye, a UCD spin-out, with a company address in Causeway, was founded by Dr Jerome O’Connell and Professor Nick Holden, UCD School of Biosystems and Food Engineering.
It processes and analyses drone and satellite imagery to obtain insights into the efficiency and sustainability of the agricultural industry. The software gives unprecedented accuracy in the measurement of crop yield, disease detection, productivity, and environmental impact from leaf to field to farm to the national scale.
Pictured (l-r) at NovaUCD are; Dr Jerome O’Connell, MD and co-founder, ProvEye and Eva Griffin, Sustainability and CSR Specialist, Ornua.
Pictured (l-r) at NovaUCD are; Donal Whelton, Head of Agriculture, AIB; Tom Flanagan, Director of Enterprise and Commercialisation, UCD; Jack Cotter, co-founder, Cotter Agritech; James Maloney, Senior Regional Development Executive, Enterprise Ireland; Nick Cotter, co-founder, Cotter Agritech; Niamh Collins, Director, AgTechUCD Innovation Centre and David Bowles, Managing Partner, The Yield Lab.
