Teen entrepreneur targets farm paperwork burden with new app

A 16-year-old farmer from Northern Ireland is launching a new farm management app designed to help farmers reduce paperwork and improve day-to-day decision-making.

Ben O’Connor, a fourth-generation County Down dairy farmer, developed the software after previously building a successful gift box business, Giftery, which sold about 200,000 units in three years after being launched when he was just 13 years old.

His latest project, Farm Flow, aims to bring multiple areas of farm management into one system, including compliance task tracking, medicine records and nutrition planning.

See also: How award-winning ag student graduated to a role in farm tech

The app also includes a “signals” feature, allowing farmers to log animal health concerns quickly.

“It’s been difficult getting into it and learning a lot of things, and how software actually works, and how that works as a business,” he says.

“I’ve always wanted to solve problems, whatever space I’m in, whether it’s making gifts more efficient and handy, or improving forms with compliance – I just like trying to improve things the best I can.” 

Advice-based system

Ben says the system is designed to learn over time and will eventually provide advice based on recurring issues.

He also hopes to develop an integrated supply chain feature for predictive supply in the future and is in talks with processors to develop the function.

“It’s all built around the idea of fewer and faster forms, and it’ll continue to expand any way that farms need to help with that paperwork,” he said.

The app is currently in a soft launch phase with about 50 users testing the system ahead of a planned full launch in August.

Early access is free, and Ben says there will always be a free version available.

“I know myself the struggles that farmers have with cashflow.”

Farm safety feature

Farm Flow also includes a safety feature that provides best-practice guidance linked to tasks farmers log into the system.

“I think farm safety is vitally important. There’s so much that can happen,” Ben says.

“The farmer should be at the centre, and it should help the farmer more than it should help the cows and one way we can do that is through farm safety.”

A simplified “Farm Flow Lite” version has also been created for less tech-savvy users.

Technology on farms

Ben, who is currently qualifying as a data protection officer, says data security was a priority and all information is stored locally and is encrypted.

“Technology on farms is now a must-have, especially with young people coming into the industry,” he says.

“I’m just trying to make something which helps farmers make better decisions to improve their farm long term, because it’s all about improving the farm’s bottom line.”