Frontier IP, the intellectual property specialist, has increased its stake in company which is developing robots to work on farms.
Edinburgh-based Frontier IP has taken its stake in Fieldwork Robotics from 21 per cent to 27.5% in return providing extra development and engineering support to the company.
Frontier’s strategy sees the group build up stakes in companies spun-out of universities by providing intellectual property (IP) commercialisation services.
Frontier IP Group Chief Executive Neil Crabb said: “This positive development further validates our approach to plugging the gap between universities and industry.”
READ MORE:Edinburgh business Frontier IP hails its progress as profits increase
Fieldwork was spun-out of the University of Plymouth to commercialise the work of robotics lecturer Martin Stoelen.
Fieldwork said the move would help accelerate the development of its agricultural robots following interest from the industry. This seen the development of a soft, adaptable robot arm which has highly sensitive grippers able to handle delicate items.
The increased support from Frontier IP will allow Fieldwork to develop a proof-of-principle, field-test ready prototype robot for harvesting vegetables and work is underway on a soft-fruit picking robot.
Frontier IP’s technology team will help plan the project and work on design, software and electronics.
Fieldwork Robotics founder and director Mr Stoelen said: “We’re delighted with the additional resources from our partner, Frontier IP. Speeding up the development of a field-ready prototype brings forward the day when the technology can be fully commercialised.”
Mr Crabb added: “By providing Fieldwork with additional hands-on support, we are ensuring the company can respond swiftly and nimbly to an exciting opportunity.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here