June 9 to 12, 2025 in Rodano, near Milan - Event premiering in Italy; 16 student teams from the Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Tunisia, Turkey, Slovenia and the United Kingdom compete with self-designed robots
(DLG) The 22nd International Field Robot Event taking place from 9 to 12 June is sponsored by the DLG (German Agricultural Society), the host of the DLG Feldtage field exhibition, where Field Robot Event has been held biennially since 2014. This year, Field Robot Event will take place in Rodano, near Milano, Italy, and is organized by the Artificial Intelligence and Robotics Laboratory (AirLab) of Politecnico di Milano. 16 international student teams have signed up to compete with their robots to achieve the best results in a test field designed to replicate real-life farming conditions.
Navigating curved maize rows with headland turns, detecting strawberry bushes, recognizing and mapping fruits, and detecting bioluminescent fungi at night conditions are the tasks that autonomous robots must perform live at the venue. The event is held in Rodano near Milan, a 700 hectare farm principally dedicated to maize.
“’With its practical focus on field robotics for farmers, it is great to have DLG as sponsor for this event which is held in Italy for the first time. The program includes new tasks, including fruit mapping, yield estimation and bioluminescent fungi detection,” says Prof Matteo Matteucci, Department of Electronics Information and Bioengineering, Politecnico di Milano.
The 16 contestant teams have spent the last months adapting and programming their robots to perform the challenging maneuvers in the field.
“Some new tasks have been introduced this year, one related to the detection and counting of fruits on trees and the other, which will be run in the dark after sunset aims to detect bioluminescent fungi.
“As for the first of these tasks, we wanted the competition to approach the orchard environment, while for the second we are eager to see these bioluminescent fungi glowing in the dark,” says Prof Matteucci.
“Being associated with the Field Robot Event this year is of particular relevance to Agritechnica. As the world’s leading trade fair for agricultural machinery, Agritechnica offers the full overview of technologies for farms all over the world. This includes field robotics, where practical market-ready solutions are presented alongside broader innovations in agricultural practice, “ says Timo Zipf, project manager of Agritechnica.
DLG’s platform “FarmRobotix” in hall 21 at Agritechnica 2025 will include the new “Digital Farm Centre” that presents trends and innovations in robotics, Artificial Intelligence (AI), automation and smart farming for crop production.
“While the Field Robot Event in Italy provides a valuable platform for testing prototypes and experimental field robotics, Agritechnica brings these innovations closer to real-world application - showcasing smart, efficient solutions that are often ready for the market. Together, the two events form a dynamic innovation pipeline, with Agritechnica leading the way—true to the theme Touch Smart Efficiency,” added Zipf.
Conducted on a field that has been pre-sown with maize, the event comprises five tasks that take place over four days:
Task 1: Autonomous maize field navigation
Task 2: Autonomous maize field navigation with Strawberry bushes detection
Task 3: Fruit mapping
Task 4: Bioluminescent fungi discovery
Task 5: Field Robot Eventstyle
Sensors, algorithms and actuators for precision tasks
With a combination of sensors like cameras and lidar, intelligent algorithms, and mechanical actuators, each robot is capable of navigating and performing tasks autonomously. Determining in real time what constitutes fruit or where the headland ends is complex, while avoiding to damage the yield requires accurate software control of the actuators that operate the robot.
The field robots will perform in public and an academic and technical jury will be judging against criteria like complexity, performance and agricultural usefulness.
Program
Monday, 9 June – Test Session
8:00-19:00 : Field Robot Event day-light field-testing sessions at the trial plot
19:00-20:00 : Dinner
20:00-00:00 : Field Robot Event night-light field-testing sessions at the trial plot
Tuesday, 10 June – 1st Day of competition
8:00-9:00 : Opening of Field Robot Event 2025
9:00-12:00 : Task 1 - Autonomous maize field navigation
12:00-13:00: Lunch
13:00-17:00: Task 2 - Autonomous maize field navigation with strawberry bushes detection
17:00-19:00: 1st day Awards of Task 1 and Task 2
19:00-20:00: Social Dinner
20:00-00:00: Social Event
Wednesday 11 June – 2nd Day of competition
8:00-12:00: Field Robot Event field-testing sessions at the trial plots
12:00-13:00: Lunch
13:00-17:00: Task 3 – Fruit Mapping
17:00-19:00: Field Robot Event field-testing sessions at the trial plots
19:00-20:00: Dinner
20:00-00:00: Task 4 - Bioluminescent Fungi Discovery
Thursday 12th June – Final day of competition
9:00-12:00: Task 5 – Field Robot Eventstyle
12:00-13:00: Final Awards and conclusion
Contestants and teams’ names:
- ROS-BOT-ROVER — Complex of Agricultural Schools in Żarnowiec (Poland)
- Kamaro Engineering e.V. — Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (Germany)
- CULS Robotics — Czech University of Life Sciences (Czech Republic)
- NMBU Robotics — Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU) (Norway)
- Son of The Sun — Tekirdag Namik Kemal University (Turkey)
- FREDT — Technische Universität Braunschweig (Germany)
- THe OWL — Technische Hochschule Ostwestfalen-Lippe (Germany)
- Carbonite — Schülerforschungszentrum Südwürttemberg, Standort Überlingen (Germany)
- Team FloriBot — Heilbronn University of Applied Sciences (Germany)
- Robatic — Wageningen University (Netherlands)
- LCASTOR — University of Lincoln (United Kingdom)
- FarmBeast — University of Maribor (Slovenia)
- Acorn — Hochschule and University Osnabrück (Germany)
- RoboTO — Politecnico di Torino (Italy)
- bir ali ben khalifa — International Civil Aviation Training Center (Tunisia)
- AIRLab POLIMI — Politecnico di Milano (Italy)
Established in 1973, the Artificial Intelligence and Robotics Laboratory at Politecnico di Milano (AIRLab), organizer of the 2025 event, is one of the longest-standing research groups in Italy working on artificial Intelligence, robotics and machine learning.
The Field Robot Event competition, which was launched in 2003 by Wageningen University in the Netherlands, tests pioneering robotics and precision farming technologies under real-world conditions and gives young scientists the opportunity to exchange and develop their ideas alongside their peers.
About DLG
With more than 31,000 farm and industry members, DLG is a politically independent and non-profit organisation. DLG draws on an international network of some 3,000 food and agricultural experts. DLG operates with subsidiaries in 10 countries and also organizes over 30 regional agricultural and livestock exhibitions worldwide. DLG’s leading international exhibitions, EuroTier for livestock farming and Agritechnica for agricultural machinery, which are held every two years in Hanover, Germany, provide international impetus for the local trade fairs. Headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, DLG conducts practical trials and tests to keep its members informed of the latest developments. DLG’s sites include DLG's International Crop Production Centre, a 600-hectare test site in Bernburg-Strenzfeld, Germany and the DLG Test Centre, Europe's largest agricultural machinery test centre for Technology and Farm Inputs, located in Gross-Umstadt, Germany. DLG bridges the gap between theory and practice, as evidenced by more than 40 working groups of farmers, academics, agricultural equipment companies and organiations that continually compare advances in knowledge in specific areas such as irrigation and precision farming.
