The fourth annual AgProfessional Editors' Choice New Product of the Year Award winners included 10 products that represent the best, newest, most innovative products introduced in 2010 for the ag retailer market and the consulting industry. The AgProfessional editorial staff selected 10 new products that they consider the greatest advances in technology or chemistry.
The winning selections are based on the facts and information provided in new releases background materials and media presentations. Product information is gathered without regard to the financials already achieved but are still evaluated on the long-term sales potential and impact on agriculture. The new products had to be announced during late December 2009 through mid-November 2010, which allows time to pick the winners for publication in this end-of-year issue of AgProfessional.
The winning companies/products were introduced with stimulating information that showed each company's excitement about introducing a revolutionary product or a major upgrade and specifically targeting the audience of AgProfessional magazine crop consultants, farm managers and ag retailers. The Top 10 products have the potential to earn income or be sold by the magazine's target audience; therefore, products targeted only to farmers and producers do not fare well in our evaluation to be one of the winners.
The judging was done by Richard Keller, editor, and Colleen Scherer, managing editor. The product award winner announcements originally mainly appeared on www.AgProfessional.com, most of them in the new product section, not in the magazine; most also were announced in either AgProfessional Weekly or Dealer Update weekly e-newsletters.
About Slingshot
Raven Industries introduced Slingshot as a new approach to precision ag powered by a major leap in connectivity that delivers advanced RTK correction signal technology and high-speed Internet. Slingshot combines this with online services and Raven hardware to give operators and growers the power to do their work at an astounding new level of accuracy, simplicity and consistency, the company announced at introduction.
Slingshot features a base station that acquires GPS data for the local region in which it is situated (usually at a Slingshot dealer's headquarters or from public CORS networks). The station distributes the data as a RTK correction signal through the Internet, via mobile cell phone towers.
With a tough, industrial-grade Slingshot Field Hub in their cab, equipment operators applying seed, fertilizer, herbicide or pesticide can receive a repeatable correction signal well over 30 miles beyond the Slingshot Base Station, the original source of data.
The Field Hub also puts a user and the field computer and all the data it moves online. No matter how remote, an operator is connected to the rest of the world in real time. With that connectivity comes Slingshot Online, a suite of online services that helps business owners manage data with ease and efficiency no matter where they or their vehicles are. They can store their entire field and application data in a secure database to access anytime, anywhere with a simple Web browser.
Managers can track vehicle locations, make on-the-fly changes to application files like prescription maps, and monitor, collect and analyze data from all their assets through a secure Slingshot account (that can update in near real time). And they can do it on any laptop, desktop or mobile computer in any country, any town, any time zone in the world. They just need Internet access to get online.
Slingshot Online connects vehicle operators to Slingshot's support team, based in North America, without ever leaving the cab. If there's an issue, Raven can diagnose it, fix it or walk that operator through it.
To view the complete list of winners visit agprofessional.com.