Adding electronic equipment to tractors and machinery has helped to revolutionise farming efficiency, and one of the earliest pioneers of the new technology was RDS, says Mike Williams.

Electronics are one of farming’s major success stories, achieving levels of precision that were unknown 40 years ago, which was when Jim Brown decided that his company’s future lay in farm electronics. He established RDS in 1969 to design farm buildings and his far-sighted switch to electronics came two years later when he realised that a device for measuring grain loss from combine harvesters could attract cereal growers.

He formed a group of electronics specialists to design the first RDS combine grain loss monitor, which worked well and was soon selling worldwide. “It was so successful that RDS is still widely known as the grain loss monitor company, even though it is 20 years since we last made one,” says managing director Richard Danby.

The grain loss monitor brought rapid expansion. Mr Danby joined the company in 1974 following a course at Silsoe College, and he was joined later by another Silsoe graduate, Peter Nelson, now the engineering director. Expansion also meant that RDS soon outgrew its original home in a converted chapel, eventually moving to a purpose-built factory and offices near Minchinhampton, Gloucestershire in 2000. Another priority was developing additional products, progressing from a one-product company to offering a wide range of electronic instruments.

“Developing new products remains crucial to the company’s growth and to its very survival,” says Mr Danby. “This is an area where technology is progressing rapidly, and the traditional image of electronics hardware engineering is long gone. All RDS instruments are now controlled by embedded software, which is why we employ seven software engineers in an engineering department with 17 staff.

Some farmers were cautious about electronic instruments in field equipment, but this has almost completely disappeared as farmers have become computer-aware. “We now design equipment for the iPhone generation of farmers”, said Mr Danby.

Although direct sales to farmers are important, most of the demand for RDS equipment is from about 80 tractor and machinery manufacturers which fit the equipment on their products. They include some of the industry’s leading names and about 80 per cent of current RDS production is exported. Turnover in 2010 grew by 10 per cent and the first six months of this year produced a 40 per cent increase over the same period last year.

Recent technical developments have concentrated on compatibility to allow equipment from different suppliers to be linked, and all new RDS products are now Isobus ready. The company will shortly be launching two all-new hardware programmes called the G-CAN and the Windows CE system-based Isocan.

Company Factfile

• Company: RDS Technology

• HQ: Minchinhampton, Stroud, Gloucester GL6 9BH.

• Owned by: Privately owned

• Employees: 80

• Annual Turnover: Approaching £10m

• Principal Products: Electronic instruments for the farming industry.