Brian Eccles of CRS Software said he expected the integration to be running in the next few months. Farmers who subscribed to both systems would see the FarmIQ stock reconciliation automatically turn up in Cashmanager. Sales, purchases, deaths and births would all be synchronised between the two programmes.
“FarmIQ will become the master and you input from that and it will turn up in Cashmanager,” he said.
“It’s very complementary.”
FarmIQ chief executive Collier Isaacs described the agreement as the first step towards more integration in the longer term.
“Farmers have been asking for data sharing. We know that farmers can struggle with livestock numbers and having to put them into multiple systems,” he said.
“It’s about making farm data work for you, rather than you working for your data.”
Annually close to $10 billion worth of farm turnover went through Cashmanager RURAL, of which half was sheep, beef or deer earnings.
CRS software had 30 years experience in the market. The Primary Growth Partnership initiative FarmIQ launched its commercial packages for farmers in August but had been in discussions with CRS software for about 12 months.
Each business was funding its own part of the work, with six staff working on the Cashmanager side, Eccles said.
He described the move as the first genuine interface link for the firm.
“It is all because we both store data on the Cloud.
“It won’t be the last either. There are more official announcements coming, so watch this space,” he said.
“It is the beginning of a whole area of integration and co-operation between agricultural software products and other tools.”
“It is the beginning of a whole area of integration and co-operation between agricultural software products and other tools.”
BRIAN ECCLES
CRS Software
Isaacs said the deal was not exclusive so FarmIQ was open to work with others. He expected the move to be positive for FarmIQ as Cashmanager had a long-standing user base and farmers might be interested in the link.
He described the farmer sign-up rate with FarmIQ since the launch in August 2014 as broadly on target.
“The Cashmanger linkage takes out a road block of double entry for farmers.”
There would be no extra cost to farmer subscribers.
FarmIQ came in range of subscription packs suitable for different levels of management.
