Flexigrobots: Flexible heterogenous multi-robot solutions for intelligent automation of precision agriculture operations
Flexigrobots
FlexiGroBots, EU-funded project for enabling efficient and automated precision agriculture operations using flexible multi-robot systems
FlexiGroBots project will run for 36 months with the main objective of creating and validating its open platform for flexible heterogeneous multi-robot systems including Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAVs) and Unmanned Ground Vehicle (UGVs). The platform will integrate existing technology platforms and components provided by various digital transformation initiatives and ecosystems, for addressing the most imperative needs of the Agriculture sector in terms of multifunctional robots, multi-robot cooperation, autonomy and awareness, and actionable data.
Through the FlexiGroBots platform, the project aims to empower roboticist, engineers, and service providers to build and deploy flexible heterogeneous multi-robot systems in the Agri-Food sector, while also providing various benefits to farmers around the world:
- Versatility for using the same robots for different observation and intervention tasks throughout the crop life cycle
- Cooperation between ground and aerial robots for more complex missions
- Relevant data to power AI-driven agricultural operations
- Autonomy for real-time adaptation of mission plans and robots’ behaviour at crop level
- Precision in agricultural operations to carry out accurate tasks, hence reducing costs and environmental footprint
Furthermore, the platform foresees an agricultural data space integrating a set of common data services to enable data collection and integration, publication and sharing, and security and trust, following the International Data Space Association reference architecture, and considering also data coming from geospatial data platforms such as Copernicus and Information Access Services (DIAS).
The FlexiGroBots platform and its different components will be demonstrated and validated within three real-life pilots of significant economic value, posing different levels of complexity regarding crops, number and types of robots used from one side, and varying levels of complexity in relation to geographical regions, weather conditions and national regulations, on the other.
