JOHN Deere is now offering customers JDLink connectivity service at no additional charge, making it easier for customers to connect machines and monitor them remotely.
“The change allows customers to quickly activate the JDLink connectivity service and manage their connected machines within their John Deere Operations Centre account, either on the web or the mobile app,” the company said in a statement.
“Connectivity subscriptions or renewals are no longer required so customers can simply activate the service and leave it on.” This offering excludes any hardware components and possible data charges and is only relevant to customers subscription to JDLink.
After logging into Operations Center, customers will be prompted and asked if they want to activate the service. “After completing a few easy steps, JDLink connectivity service will be enabled to provide simple, seamless, continuous wireless service and make it possible for customers to monitor their machines and their farm anytime from anywhere.”
An automatic enrollment feature means future purchases of equipment built with JDLink mobile telematics gateways (MTGs) can be automatically added.
Customers with existing JDLink subscription service agreements can allow them to remain in place until they expire. However, they may also convert existing subscriptions to the new connectivity service at no additional charge.
In countries outside of South Africa where customers are making use of their own sim card, they will still be responsible for their own data cost, but the JDLink subscription remains free.
“As farm sizes continue to grow, which requires the farmer to be in different places at once, with JDLink it allows the farmer to remotely be in different places at the same time,” the company said.