Since its acquisition by Alltech just over two years ago, Keenan has seen a range of major investments by the Lyons family into its diet feeder manufacturing business.

Vertical tub feeders are now part of the lineup, as are self-propelled machines. Not happy with these two major developments, Alltech Keenan has also invested in the InTouch system – the management system Keenan developed to review and support farmers with skilled nutritionists using simple technology.

The InTouch support centre previously located in Kilkenny has now moved to the Alltech European bioscience centre in Dunboyne, Co Meath. Here a team of nutritionists monitor the feeding of more than 300,000 cows worldwide that are fed using InTouch.

The system was built on over 1.3m data points and currently has more than 3,000 interactive users.

Benchmarking compares your herd to others within the system. A global SIM card in each machine allows the information to be shared and viewed via the cloud by the InTouch nutritionists.

Alltech Keenan has other centres in France, New Zealand, Germany, South Africa and Denmark.

InTouch business development manager Eddie Daly said: “We are looking at information through the eyes of the farmer. The system allows Alltech Keenan to execute the MechFiber feeding sequence which was developed in the 2000s more consistently.

“Information collected from InTouch has a direct bearing on the farm, feedmills and supermarkets in instances where it is shared for a common good.”