Due to on-going concern over the spread of coronavirus (COVID-19) and related travel restrictions,
the AEF decided to cancel the 2021 Fall Plugfest that was scheduled from September 20th to September 24th in Stuttgart, Germany.
In its place, the AEF is organizing a virtual Plugfest from September 21st to September 23rd. Virtual Plugfest registration will open via the AEF Database for participants soon. Testers will have the possibility to register their equipment for VT & TC testing.

Morning and afternoon test sessions are planned during all Plugfest days to offer testing capabilities for all AEF Member companies across different continents and time zones.

The status of the F2F meeting of the General Assembly will be decided in the upcoming weeks. 
We apologize for these changes and any inconvenience they might cause, thank you for your understanding.


We look forward to meet you all soon and hope that this will be possible in 2022.

Jürgen Hollstein will retire end of July this year and will be succeeded by Stefan Stahlmecke as new representative from John Deere.

Since the beginning of AEF in 2008, Jürgen Hollstein worked in the Steering Committee and supported the AEF with his experience and knowledge of Ag machinery. He was also a member of the AEF Finance Committee and led the task force Common Software Library for the past two years. On behalf of the whole SC and Chair Group we wish him a well deserved and enjoyable retirement. The AEF thanks Jürgen for his 13 years of service with a ‘virtual plaque’.

Thank you Peter Münch and welcome Johannes Lange and Christian Jungkind

Peter Münch has left his AEF team leader position in June this year. Since the beginning of the AEF, he has been in charge of the functional safety team and did a great job combining all the safety relevant needs from AEF Project Teams into several guidelines. Especially the support of TIM with the so called “Cage approach” was an important step forward with the launch of the tractor implement management.

Johannes Lange from Claas will succeed Peter Münch as team lead and Christian Jungkind from John Deere taking over the role of Deputy Team Lead.

New Deputy for Data Management: Jason Roesbeke
AEF is very pleased to introduce Jason Roesbeke from CNH Industrial, based in Bruges, Belgium as another Deputy Team Lead for the Expert Team Data Management. He takes on the role alongside Joe Tevis (USA / company Vis4Ag).

Following on from last summer’s updates and thanks to the continual feedback from the AEF Service Council, the Database Service team have been hard at work and have recently released even more improvements to the AEF ISOBUS Database.

FMIS Conformance Test
As with all conformance tests and certified compatibility our goal in the end is satisfied customers.
In today's agricultural workday, farm management information systems (FMIS) play an important role. Documentation is essential. Customers expect to be able to plan tasks with products and rates, manage field boundaries and guidance data. With precision farming, variable rate application maps (Rx Maps) also come into play.

The AEF Conformance Test for the new AEF Functionality File Server is released.

The AEF Steering Committee decided in Feb 2021 to release the Conformance Test and close the File Server project on the advice of the Project Team. Since then, the Project Team, under the current lead of Henrik Bogelund (TeeJet Technologies) has been preparing the Conformance Test and Guideline for release in summer 2021.

In April 2021, the AEF organized a proof of concept to demonstrate the latest developments in Wireless-Infield-Communication together with the University HTW Saar and the company OSB AG.

Approximately 3 years after the initial WIC test of radio technology, the AEF took the chance and performed a field test to try out the first WIC feature implementation. The goal was to gather experience in the areas of functionality, range and user feedback of wireless process data exchange in cooperative multi machine use cases. Using equipment from Fendt, Case IH, CLAAS, Lemken and Amazone a wide variety of typical use cases were performed.

The AEF Security Team is looking for expertise from AEF companies in the following areas:

• Vehicle Ethernet Security Configuration - This expert will help to review and collaborate on setting up the Ethernet communications stack with a focus on security for the AEF High Speed ISOBUS (HSI) design.  This expert may already exist in the Information Technology (IT) department of your company.
• Vehicle Wireless Dedicated Short Range Communications (DSRC) Security - This expert will help to review and guide the DSRC security implementation of IEEE 1609.2 & 1609.3 for the AEF Wireless Infield Communications (WIC) design.  This role is quite specialized and different from normal WIFI communications.

If you can help or have questions, please contact:
Bradley Nielsen, Team Leader of the Security Team
bradley.nielsen@cnhind.com
or
Andreas Vollbracht, Deputy
Andreas.Volbracht@claas.com

MC Elettronica S.r.l.
MC Elettronica is a company specializing in design of sensors and “high tech” electronic components for agricultural machines, dedicated to PRECISION FARMING, able to accompany the user in all passages from sowing to harvesting.
MC Elettronica is still an independent family-owned company, with over 40 years of experience, dedicated to the development and manufacture of innovative standard or custom components for precision farming.

The company, characterized by high flexibility when it comes to the market’s many needs, aims to guarantee a high-quality service to customers, creating increasingly innovative and competitive products to many international manufacturers of the Agricultural sector.

Interested in the following AEF Teams: HSI, MV and WIC

Agricon GmbH
Agricon is a full-service provider for precision farming solutions. It offers a wide range of products dedicated to improve crop production from the subfield to the whole farm. The family run company serves customers in all middle and eastern European countries. The main focus lays in agronomical algorithms to significantly improve crop yields and save inputs.
The solutions range from soil analysis, N-Sensors, user terminals, data logging to an independent farm management system. Always implemented on the farm with an intensive consulting and training schedule.

Compatibility and the plug-an-play approach of the ISOBUS is the major reason to join the AEF. Agricon is looking forward to bring its in-depth knowledge of agronomic precision farming to the working groups.

Neways Electronics International N.V. 
Neways Electronics International N.V. is active in the international EMS (Electronic Manufacturing Services) market. As System Innovator and life cycle partner we offer our clients custom-made solutions for the complete product life cycle (from product development to after-sales service) of both electronic components and complete (box-built) electronic control systems. Operating in a niche of the EMS market we focus primarily on small to medium-sized special series, in which quality, flexibility and time-to-market play a crucial role.

Next to the Agriculture industry Neways products are used in sectors such as Semiconductor, Medical, Automotive and Industrial. Our operating companies are located in the Netherlands, Germany, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, China and the United States, with a total of 2,700 employees.

ImageLine
Image Line is an Italian company – included in Italian official registry for innovative SMEs – that develops softwares, web portals and databases for agriculture since 1988.

QdC® - Quaderno di Campagna® is Image Line's farm management information systems for sustainable agriculture: is used by cooperatives, associations of farmers, agri-consultants or directly from growers. Today 12,000 farms in Italy are managed on the cloud thanks to QdC®. The web application is integrated with databases on agrochemicals, fertilizers and other inputs for agricultural production, in order to help users to plan and register farming operations in a correct way. The database for pesticides is called Fitogest.com; it was created in 1989, it's online since 2000 and is regularly updated...

ifm group of companies
When it comes to pioneering automation and digitization technology, the ifm group of companies is your ideal partner. Since its foundation in 1969 ifm has developed, produced and sold sensors, controllers, software and systems for industrial automation worldwide. As one of the pioneers of Industry 4.0, ifm develops and implements consistent solutions to digitize the entire value chain “from sensor to ERP”. Today, the second-generation family-run group has more than 7,300 employees and is one of the worldwide market leaders. It combines the internationality and innovative strength of a growing group of companies with the flexibility and close customer contact of a medium-sized company – true to the slogan "ifm - close to you"!