DSU student designs inventory software for Hadrick Ranch

April 9, 2026

When cyber operations major Austin Kaiser was home one weekend in Faulkton, South Dakota, he overheard his parents and their friends, Troy and Stacy Hadrick, discussing a concern with their ranch-to-table business.

Hadrick Ranch, a fifth-generation ranching operation led by Troy and Stacy, has several restaurant partners in South Dakota that feature Hadrick Ranch beef on the menu and ships direct to consumers. Their premium angus beef is built on cattle genetics translating to elite eating experiences.

As business has grown, however, a problem arose with inventory management. Specifically, Stacy stressed the difficulty of keeping track what was available for their partners to feature in restaurants. Kaiser quickly mentioned an interest in helping solve the problem and requested to visit the ranch.

Stacy showed Kaiser around their freezers and talked to him about how the ranch was trying to track the meat quantities, and where it's stored. At the time, they were manually tracking inventory, which led to inefficient handling of customer orders and invoices. Kaiser then developed technical solutions for their needs.

"We talked about what devices they wanted it on and how they wanted it to work," he said. "And I built them a very simple version of the app, and they really loved it."

Kaiser spent about seven months completing the project, which required him to learn Apple development tools and programming languages. To do this, he purchased a MacBook and taught himself independently through online resources.

It took Kaiser about four to five months to build the Mac version, less than a month to integrate cloud functionality, and some additional time to develop the iPhone application. He accomplished this all while balancing four senior-level undergraduate courses, one master's course, and teaching responsibilities as an adjunct instructor.

"We handed Austin a real-world problem and he gave us a solution that perfectly met our needs," Troy said.

Since then, he's continued to meet with the Hadricks to learn about features they would like added to update the app.

The application tracks inventory for meat cuts, weights, and freezer locations, has real-time database filtering and search capabilities on mobile, tracks transaction and customer order records, and has automatic PDF invoice generation for customers.

Prior to the application, Hadrick Ranch wrote out customer receipts, but after adding the PDF invoice auto-generation, he saved Troy and Stacy even more time.

"He called me, and he said, 'This is my favorite thing you've ever done, and it was a really great moment for me,'" Kaiser shared.

"It's been a very fun process working with them and getting that started," Kaiser said.

This project enabled Kaiser to apply the core concepts of classes he's taken, such as data structures, computer science, and web development.

"Being able to work for a real company, work for a family friend, and solve real-world problems that save them time, is a huge thing for me," he said. "I think that's very fulfilling. It makes me extremely happy thinking about the time I'm saving them."

Kaiser hopes to expand the system to help other farmers or small businesses manage inventory and operations.

He is currently in his senior year of a cyber operations degree, while also in the process of earning his master's degree in artificial intelligence, and working as an adjunct instructor.

Tags: Cyber All News The Beacom College of Computer & Cyber Sciences Academics