416. Beck’s Hybrids’ Jim Schwartz on SeedIQ, enabling better on-farm decisions through Practical Farm Research + balancing innovation adoption with risk assessment

From seed selection to input purchases and beyond, farmers are responsible for a litany of data points that require decisions on their operations each season. Having tools to enable confident, informed decisions isn’t just a “nice to have” in modern production agriculture, it’s imperative. We are joined by Beck’s Hybrids’ Jim Schwartz, Director of Research, Agronomy and Practical Farm Research, to talk about the launch of their new platform – SeedIQ – its capabilities and the dealer, and farmer, mindset heading into a growing season.  Highlights include:  What PFR (Practical Farm Research) does to help farmers grow their operations and how it’s different than other research projects within companies Conversations with growers heading into the planting season; what those entail, how they are preparing and their sentiment given the current headwinds being faced The power of certainty being tied to decision-making and how Jim has seen expectations shift over the years when it comes to seed performance, agronomic support and digital tools The balance of innovation adoption and risk management  “Innovation that matters” and what that means to the Beck’s team, their definition of innovation and its implications beyond ROI Launching SeedIQ, what the platform does and how it better serves dealers and farmers The gaps Jim and the team identified that led them to develop the SeedIQ platform Dealer and grower response to the launch of the tool heading into a growing season What’s ahead for Beck’s this planting season that has Jim excited