Monil, a Norwegian livestock technology company, is adding a calving alert and a set of grazing tools to its virtual fencing collars, its chief commercial officer Janna Hovstad told AgNavigator. The calving alert, which reads a cow's movements to tell whether she is giving birth, becomes available to farmers in October.
Founded in 2022, Monil makes solar-powered Cattle Collars that track where cows are and let farmers move grazing boundaries digitally instead of shifting fences by hand. The company says it has sold more than 80,000 devices in the EU, the UK and the US and plans to expand further.
Its app will add real-time and historical pasture data, heat maps showing how intensively each area has been grazed, and the option to divide pastures into smaller sections, according to a company press release. Collar-to-collar communication over Bluetooth and satellite connectivity are due next year.
"The virtual fence is the starting point," Hovstad said, adding that the company is working to make managed grazing and pasture planning simpler in the app.
The virtual fencing market has drawn several entrants, among them New Zealand's Halter, which reached a $2 billion valuation after raising NZ$377 million. Monil says it competes on ease of use and a low minimum order: a farmer can trial the system with as few as six collars before scaling up. It sells directly to farmers and is building a team across the US Midwest.
The company has also extended the warranty on its collars from five to ten years, which Hovstad described as moving risk from the producer to the company. Next, Monil wants to give farmers more detailed insight into grazing patterns, including recommendations on when and where to move animals.
Photo: CSIRO / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 3.0)
Source: AgNavigator
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