Toby Mottram

I am Toby Mottram I have been inventing and developing new digital technologies for agriculture for a long time.

Services offered in agritechnology :-

I am the founder of three companies and a prominent figure in the UK agricultural engineering sector. I began as a working herdsman in the 1970s and retrained as an engineer. During my academic career I co- invented robotic milking, developed cow breath sampling, in-line milk analysis and the rumen telemetry bolus. After Silsoe Research closed I focused on commercialising products from research particularly the pH bolus, antimicrobial monitoring and most recently automated milk progesterone measurement. The products combined sensor technology with web enabled data management systems. I completed a BBSRC/Royal Society of Edinburgh Enterprise Fellowship in 2016 to develop Milkalyser and subsequently raised £1.6 m to develop the prototype milk analyser. Milkalyser was acquired in 2020 by Lely the market leader in robotic milking. eCow was sold in 2020. I used the money to buy a field to develop as a food forest with rented out allotments. I retain some plots to try out new ideas

email : toby@digitalagritech.com linkedin.com/in/tobymottramdigitalagritech

Instagram @robothayes

Posts Held

2022- present Founder and Managing Director of Aylesbeare Food Forest Ltd (trading as Digital Agritech) and established Robot Hayes as a test and development centre for horticultural robots. Currently developing techniques for safe working with robots.

2007 – 2021 Founder
and Chief Technology Officer of eCow. Sold over £1m in rumen telemetry systems globally to researchers since 2011. During lockdown redeveloped the rumen telemetry system to use LoRa for longer range telemetry and sold the company.

2017- 2020 Founder and Technical Consultant of Milkalyser Ltd, based in Exeter. Raised £1.6m in equity, InnovateUK grants, loans and corporate investment to develop a novel system for monitoring progesterone in milk.

2015-2016 BBSRC/Royal Society of Edinburgh Enterprise Fellowship to develop and commercialise the Milkalyser concept and bring a new company to seed investment stage.

2012-2017 Douglas Bomford Trust Chair in Farm Mechanisation at the Royal Agricultural University at Cirencester. Developing research and teaching in agritechnology particularly precision livestock farming.

2010- 2013 Coordinator of Agricultural Greenhouse Gas Research and Development projects for Defra this was a £12.7 m programme to improve the UK inventory (part-time)

2005 – 2009 Programme Manager and Technical Authority for Condition Based Monitoring for ITITechmedia Ltd., Glasgow, developing a wireless sensor network for dairy cow health management. He laid out the research objectives for the programme and commissioned the research.

1998 – 2005 Project Leader (Principal Scientist), Silsoe Research Institute, Bio-Engineering Division, Developing non-invasive methods of monitoring dairy cow health and fertility automatically. Set up the first biosensors laboratory in the Institute. Developed sensing systems for ketosis, mastitis, nutritional status and progesterone (for ovulation prediction). Set up Well Cow Ltd.

1989 – 1998 Project Leader (Senior Scientist), Silsoe Research Institute (Projects – Design methodology for robotic milking, Teat inspection systems for robotic milking, electronic nose to detect oestrus in dairy cows)

Education and Qualifications

2016 elected Fellow of Royal Academy of Engineering

2014 BSc Software Development and eCommerce, Open University

1993 Chartered Engineer by Institution of Agricultural Engineers

1992 PhD Automation of Milking, Cranfield University

1987 MSc Agricultural Machinery Engineering, Silsoe College, Cranfield University

1986 BA (Hons) First Class Agriculture and Engineering, Open University

1975 Agricultural Apprenticeship, Barony College, Dumfries

Recent Publications (over 50 in total, 20 patents ) https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Toby_Mottram

T Mottram, 2016, Animal board invited review: precision livestock farming for dairy cows with a focus on oestrus detection. animal 11/2015 DOI:10.1017/S1751731115002517

Mottram T. T., 2015, The effect of husbandry system on rumen pH in dairy cows. 66th Conference of the EAAP, Warsaw; 09/2015

C Turner, H Knobloch , J Richards , P Richards, T Mottram, D Marlin, M Chambers, 2012,  Development of a device for sampling cattle breath, Biosystems Engineering, Volume 112, Issue 2, June 2012, Pages 75–81

Mottram T T¹, Lowe J, McGowan M, Phillips N, 2008, Technical Note: A wireless telemetric method of monitoring clinical acidosis in dairy cows,  Computers and electronics in Agriculture, Volume 64, Issue 1, November 2008,  45-48.

Professional memberships

Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering

Fellow of Institution of Agricultural Engineers