Data for Animal Health and Welfare
Tim Hammerich
News Reporter
New low cost internet-connected sensors are giving livestock and poultry producers new insights into animal health and welfare. Veterinarian Alan Beynon left private practice after decades to start a technology company because of what he was learning from poultry data.
Beynon… “So a lot of what we were collecting as data didn't make sense to me. And it was part of my training that I've been told X and Y are the causation of problem Z. What we found quite quickly was that wasn't correct because we'd never measured things. And when we did measure things, we got results we didn't expect. When we could change behavior, so we go back to the farm, we talk to the farm who's in charge. We get them to change the controller system to make a small alteration, and then see the benefit that that yielded. That to me then was quite compelling because I could see I could actually make changes which improved animal health and welfare, and ultimately profitability for that particular individual. So that was one of the compelling points.”
Beynon started Poultry Sense, and five years later he successfully sold the company to Merck Animal Health.
