AgTech Field Technician

Vivid Machines • Harvest/Temp • Santa Rosa, California, United States • max $30 / hour • 13h ago

Are you looking for a new opportunity that will help you apply your skills, learn new ones, and advance your career?

Well… have we got the job for you! We are looking for an AgTech Field Technician (Summer) to join our team to work outside and collect data on farms in California. As one of the early members of Vivid Machines, your job will be to help us with field research, be our expert in all things plants, and evaluate how our technology is performing.

We're Vivid Machines.

We're building cutting-edge technology, including spectral sensors and a state-of-the-art computer vision system and analytics platform, to help fruit growers with yield management, and detection of pests, diseases, and nutrient deficiencies. We have an aggressive goal to bring our products to the world quickly. Our vision is to revolutionize agricultural production to help growers solve food security globally!

Join our extraordinary team.

We're a rapidly growing venture-backed start-up headquartered in Toronto, Canada with customers in Canada, the US, and New Zealand. Our talented multidisciplinary team are leaders in computer vision, software, and hardware who work collaboratively with fruit growers globally to build products that will make a difference.

We value excellence, integrity, curiosity and passion, people who are open-minded then decisive, and the ability to iterate quickly and deliver. We're innovators on a mission!

We’re always looking for curious talented people who excel in their areas of unique expertise and who want to make an impact on the world with their work.

How you’ll make an impact.

As an AgTech Field technician, you will work closely with our customers to provide the best possible experience by carrying out a data collection plan and helping in-field with the deployment of the Vivid X system and collection of fruit growth data. You will help interpret the results for growers, and support with information on how they may use the data to improve their operations.

You will also work closely with our data annotation and engineering teams to provide feedback and direction on what you discover in the field, and how we may make improvements to data collection, annotation, and our overall sensor and computer vision system.

If you’re curious, and enjoy a combination of hands-on fieldwork, customer relationship development, team collaboration, project planning, and analysis, this role is for you!

What you’ll be doing:

First things first: you will get full training on our tools and technology, then have shadowing sessions with the team.
Once you are up to speed, you will have 6 main responsibilities:

Carry out field trials to test our technology at various grape growth stages, analyze outcomes, and provide feedback on how to improve outcomes.
Work in-field to capture images of relevant plant physiology throughout the growing season with our sensor and manually capture count and size data for comparison. You will work with our technology team to oversee the analysis and interpretation of results collected in the field.
Be our in-house expert on plant physiology and disease issues, and participate in internal and external meetings and communications, and create a hub of resources and information (cause we all like to learn!).
Demoing the Vivid X system to potential customers and building relationships for future partnerships.
Work with our data and technology team to help advise on product requirements and reports on customer needs, problems, interests, and potential for new products and services.
Annotating data frames collected from the field to help train the Vivid X system

Starting in early June, you will be trained in the field and in the office on how to use the technology. You will be working 8-hour days, 5 days a week. You’ll need a driver’s license and vehicle for your time in the field, which we expect to be the majority of the time (great for outdoor enthusiasts!) depending on the weather. Your infield work will be at vineyards in the Napa County with occasional travel to other areas in California. Your office days will be remote.

Note: This is a summer/seasonal position from June to end of August.

What you need to bring:

A deep respect for farmers and farming, and a passion for agronomy and agriculture technology.
An understanding of plant physiology, and related pests, diseases, and the impact of nutrient deficiencies
An excellent understanding of Excel
Curiosity about the latest developments in artificial intelligence and hardware technology, and how they can be applied to solve big problems in agriculture
A willingness to roll up your sleeves and try things – whether it’s driving an ATV, testing mechanical components, troubleshooting technology, or working with a grower to learn more about fruit production.
You’re comfortable working in an environment where things move fast, and you can roll up your sleeves and get things done! You’ve got this!
You love to work outside and are highly motivated and target driven
A valid driver’s license and access to a vehicle

People from all backgrounds can succeed at Vivid Machines. We believe differences and diversity help build excellent businesses.

Why do you want to work at Vivid Machines?

You will be offered a competitive compensation package
You will learn about cutting-edge technology including artificial intelligence, and how it can be applied to solve problems and develop products
You can help build an amazing product in a company that plans to change the world