Featured Application: Poultry Patrol

The Ignite Minnesota team (part of Red Wing Ignite) announced the winners of their recent Ag Tech reverse pitch challenge in early 2019. Top honors went to Jack Killian, the creator of Poultry Patrol, a robot that uses video analytics to mark dead birds in a poultry house on a digital map so humans can remove them. Poultry Patrol will receive $12,500 as the winner of the challenge, which was made possible with support from US Ignite and ADM, and additional in-kind donations from other IgniteMN partners.

Community Profile:

Technology Strengthens Community in Red Wing, Minnesota.

Entrepreneurs, businesses, and students in today’s world have one thing in common: the more advanced technology they have at their fingertips, the more likely they are to thrive. With that commonality as a starting point, Red Wing Ignite brings these groups together in its industrious namesake town along the majestic Mississippi River to create a diverse and dynamic business community ecosystem, where ideas are shared and resources are optimized.

Thanks to key technology partner Hiawatha Broadband Communications (HBC), the City of Red Wing, and the additional supporting organizations making it possible, this tech hub for the greater Minnesota area is uniquely positioned to develop smart gigabit applications addressing local community needs. And the impact covers more than just one community.

HBC’s fiber optic transport ring connects more than twenty southern Minnesota cities with multiple 10 GB and 100 GB backbones—the technology that Red Wing is currently leveraging to spur innovation. And the end result of the innovation? Local and regional economic development through new company creation and job expansion. At the end of the chain, the benefit goes not only to Red Wing residents but to folks throughout the region.

As a rural community with a population of 16,526, Red Wing offers a unique perspective within the growing body of SGCs around the country. The gigabit applications and related services developed in Red Wing could likely be deployed in small towns across the country with similar environmental conditions. Because no matter where you are in America—from the coastal hotbeds of innovation to tight-knit communities on the Mississippi—when like-minded people get together to share ideas for the application of new technology, great things happen.