Presentation at Digital Exeter, July2017. Prof. Toby Mottram talks about his ten year journey building Tech start-ups in the Dairy Farming Industry.

1. Ten years of tech development and
company building
Prof. Toby Mottram FREng

2. Our Market is Global and growing
200 m cows worldwide with annual income of £2000 = £40bn
turnover pa. Growing at 4-8 % annually, 1 million managers

4. Robotic Milker
invented in UK
commercialised
by de Laval

5. Main Challenges in Dairy Cow
Management
 Getting Cows pregnant (fertility)
 Feeding them correctly (rumen nutrition)
 Health management
 Calving (transition)
 Lameness
 Mastitis


6. Ecow invented rumen pH bolus
Patented 2007
Inserted by mouth
Retained in cows stomach
Data downloaded by radio to smartPhone
Improves cow nutrition
500 sold annually with 40% growth annually

7.  Developing in-line milk analysis of progesterone
 Solving the fertility crisis in dairying
 Raised £1.2 m of grants and equity investment
 Now recruiting engineers and analysts
 Product Launch planned for 2018

8.  Visionary
 To map global animal health data and drug use
 A strategy for the next 20 years
 Opportunistic
 SmartAgriFood 100% funded !
 We had a software team but no money
 Needed capability in RESTful tech in eCow and
Milkalyser
 Raised our profile
VirtualVet (2014….)
Now a company with a growing database but no paying customers yet

9. Getting eCow Started
 Filed a patent (cost £130)
 Won a £70k grant from Smart Scotland
 First customer 2011
 Kept the day job at Scottish Enterprise
 Recruited a designer
 Grew with sales, retain good people,
sack the bad

10. Start small, aim large
 Don’t give up the day job
 Keep the costs down
 Bootstrap
 Win grants
 Free money but there is a cost
 File patents
 With minimal help
 Be opportunistic
 Survive
 What do funders want
 Jobs - GVA
 Growth
 Visible results
 Fashion driven
 Need matching funding

11. Grantsmanship
 Check out the scope
 Do background research
 what is the hit rate ?
 How big is the fund ?
 Cost/benefit of writing the proposal
 Look at the submission date
 Recycle words from the call
 Help the assessors see that the call requirements are met
 Make use of resubmit options if you get turned down

12. Summary
 After 10 years
 I am not rich
 I work about 40 hours a week
 I am rarely stressed by money or work
 I have an exit plan to sell the businesses as they
mature
 I have participated in revolutionising the dairy industry
 I love Friday afternoons when I look around me...