Read how pest control companies get a customized, smart solution based on Cumulocity.
Customer
A company in the business of digital pest control leverages smart technology to address a niche gap in the market. It was founded as a joint venture between an executive management organization and tech development specialists.
The innovative startup uses Cumulocity for its products to monitor insect and rodent infestations and implement countermeasures quickly. It’s no surprise that as the company has grown, so too has the interest from further investors.
Challenges
- High effort, time, and personnel costs of traditional pest control
- Digitalization pressure and growing health & safety compliance
- Environmental impact associated with using pesticides
Outcomes
- New IoT-enabled service model unique to the industry
- Significant time and cost savings through real-time remote monitoring
- Early detection of pests to avoid infestations
- Targeted reaction and measures
- Reduced need for pesticides
- Digital monitoring prevents downtimes in production facilities
- Customer-friendly, scalable out-of-the-box solution
- Automated pest classification using artificial intelligence (AI)
It is a quantum leap for pest control. Our product moves the physical detection of insects into the cloud and delivers a smart solution for pest control companies as well as end customers.
Details
Pest control in modern times
Who likes to talk about cockroaches, bugs, or moths when talking about their own business? Pest control is an unpopular topic and is subject to high compliance requirements in many areas. In the past, pest control was primarily handled in a traditional way in logistics, gastronomy, food, and pharmaceutical businesses, meaning that traps were set and checked at regular intervals. This could be very costly and time-consuming—with staff being especially scarce in this industry.
For high-tech storage facilities, this means production downtime once or twice a year because the facilities need to be shut down for inspections. And for pest controllers, these inspections are hard work, often round-the-clock, seven days a week: Depending on the customer, hundreds of pests need to be counted and clustered manually.
Digitalized traps
A smart solution gives pest control companies a customized approach based on Cumulocity. This IoT platform won over the startup with its fast time-to-market and flexible customization capabilities because it enables them to develop solutions easily and bring them to market quickly. The solution consists of a monitor box, which contains an attractant or pheromone, and a digital unit that uses sensors to capture environmental data such as humidity or temperature, and transmits it to the IoT platform together with a live image of the adhesive surface. The issue of rodent monitoring is also covered: an additional solution allows pest controllers and their customers to digitally monitor snap traps for optimal resource planning.The use of manual rodent traps is subject to very strict regulations, and the traps must be frequently checked onsite by pest controllers in case of an infestation. That not only costs time but drives high personnel costs as well.
Customizable flexible dashboards enable users to conveniently check the trap data. The traps are connected to the cloud via a WiFi or LoRaWAN. The cloud solution is equipped with an AI tool that categorizes the objects in the live images into pests, vermin, or beneficial insects and populates the dashboard with this information.
Elevating pest control
This smart solution has everything needed to turn pest control into a modern, customer-oriented service: It creates digital added value that opens the user’s door to new offerings. “The insect cloud allows real-time remote monitoring and means enormous time and cost savings,” says the Managing Director of the company behind the solution. “Companies can detect infestations faster and significantly easier, allowing them to prevent further damage through timely countermeasures. Routine controls are no longer conducted onsite. Instead, they’re done digitally, so downtimes in production facilities are a thing of the past,” explains Ruoff.
How sustainable pest control works
The solution is offered in a leasing model at attractive prices. Beginners can try out the devices and subscribe to flexible options including an all-inclusive package. Pest controllers can use the time saved to proactively improve their customer relationships and develop preventative measures or invest in recruiting personnel. Sustainability is also a huge topic. One customer relies on breeding its own beneficial insects to naturally get rid of pests, while another uses laser technology. In any case, the solution puts companies a huge step ahead because they can prevent a bigger infestation with early detection and use fewer chemicals to eradicate it.
Boosting efficiency through digital monitoring
Customers can deploy as few or as many traps as they need to monitor their facility. The LoRaWAN devices are connected without any additional programming effort to the Loriot Network Server via a standard interface, so all third-party providers can be integrated in the Cumulocity platform.
Evaluating the environmental data gives companies comprehensive insights into the conditions that favor pest infestations. One customer—a grist mill—uses the solution to investigate how temperature and humidity influence an emerging infestation to deploy fast countermeasures. Industrial companies, in particular, can significantly improve their efficiency through digital monitoring because it completely eliminates downtimes in production facilities caused by traditional pest control.
Growth through scalable new markets
The solution is a success—as shown by the proud customer base the company has built in a short time, including customers from the top four pest control companies in Germany. Despite challenges in its early years due to the COVID pandemic, the startup has doubled in size since it was founded in 2019 and aims to conquer additional markets in the industrial, pharmaceutical, hospitality, and gastronomy sectors. Since the IoT devices can be deployed at any location, this gives users a wide variety of opportunities to create a digital network of customers, pest controllers, and auditors.
The company aims to become the collecting point for all data related to pest control. The young company certainly does not suffer from a scarcity of ideas. “Some ideas apply to niches within the niche, such as bedbugs in hotels. Here we’re planning digital round-the-clock monitoring of room temperature, which must remain at 50°C for 48 hours after an infestation,” says the Managing Director. But niche topics also have a market and Cumulocity enables quick and easy connection of external systems—and the team wants to fully explore these opportunities.
Text taken over from the original – Cumulocity
