Frequently asked questions.

Farmers are intimately knowledgeable about their own parcels of land—we have no intention of replacing that.

What CIBO does is fill the information gap for any stakeholder who needs to make better-informed, objective decisions about land parcels with which he or she are not personally familiar—for example, when an individual is purchasing or leasing a new piece of land, or when a bank is considering approving a loan for a farmer.

First and foremost, most agriculture applications focus on farm management, not the objective land evaluation that CIBO provides.

Second, other offerings rely upon farmers or users to input local data about their land—CIBO uses a science-based approach that removes that data input burden from farmers’ shoulders.

Last, while other offerings might address elements of farmland information, none deliver to individual users the same depth and scale of land information—at the parcel level and at national scale—as what’s made available by CIBO. For instance:

• Only CIBO combines public data with proprietary insights driven by ecosystem simulation, computer vision, and data science to deliver comprehensive, science-based, and objective information about land parcels.
• Only CIBO brings objective valuation to what has been a highly fragmented land valuation process, and enables users to predict a parcel’s future productivity and value.
• Only CIBO delivers rich, accurate insights about land parcels via a single technology platform.

Our goal at CIBO is to create a new, common “language” that will help inform and drive the decisions of any land stakeholder, even those who aren’t personally familiar with a particular parcel.

Some of the best minds in the industry back the proprietary data and insights provided by CIBO.
CIBO derives our unique data and insights by combining:

• an objective, scientific approach built upon more than 30 years of proven academic research across the U.S.;
• technology that simulates the way plants grow on a daily basis, in varied environments, which we exclusively license from Michigan State University; and
• powerful, breakthrough technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning.

But we don’t rely upon science and technology alone. Our CIBO Farmers Advisory Network (CFAN) members and other farmers around the country helped us create (and now, help us continually update) the extensive, farm-level dataset used to test and validate the results of all of the models, simulations, algorithms, and insights that go into the CIBO platform. These farmer partners help us ensure all of CIBO’s science, products, and proprietary metrics are in keeping with reality.

Simply put, we replace the local land information historically input by farmers, with science.

The CIBO technology relies upon proven, scientific modeling that helps us understand “how a plant grows,” for instance. We generate rich insights from that kind of raw data by applying proprietary data science algorithms, computer vision, and AI modeling to remotely sensed data (such as satellite images). Then we combine those insights with easy access to publicly available data, for a unified set of rich land details about each parcel.

Since we value—but don’t rely upon—local data input by farmers, we unburden farmers from having to input data details about their land and enable our insights to scale infinitely.

CIBO’s proprietary algorithms update continuously based upon real-time data—such as weather information and satellite imagery—in order to reflect the latest market and on-the-ground developments. In addition, CIBO data and insights that feature different types of in-season forecasts—such as yield forecast, planting acres, and harvest status—also continually update during the growing season