The authors introduce their vision of modern world understanding by the managers and engineering staff of agricultural enterprises in the era of total communications and digitalization of agriculture, referring to the “seventh sense” as a fundamental instinct for comprehension of reality and existence which places human at the centre. In the technical age, engineering marketing is crucial in terms of perception of innovation technology advantages for development of a new entrepreneurial way of thinking, especially for engineers, given their significant participation in commercial projects of agro-industrial complex. The development of integrated hybrid production in agro-industrial complex for innovative agricultural production taking into account different business lines of various enterprises of the complex is suggested to achieve synergy and build a socially-oriented system. The proposals for business development are also introduced.

On the one hand, engineering marketing is a new and groundbreaking paradigm in marketing evolution in national practice, which helps to integrate design and engineering competencies with market mindset. On the other hand, the study course “Engineering Marketing” is intended for development of a new knowledge type, new cross-disciplinary style as a symbiosis of scientific thought and market ideology providing a way to create a market-minded generation of engineers capable of developing technology entrepreneurship taking into account scientific and technological progress. The concept of engineering marketing toolkit is developed by the authors in the form of engineering marketing mix formula (EMM = f (nP)) considering its evolutionary changes and engineering marketing business model is presented including corresponding impact effects of engineering solutions on the target market using the psycho heuristic programming method. In the digital economy such a tool in the engineering marketing mix as processing acquires particular importance assuming the use of information technologies and systems, including engineering software, at all stages of engineering activity. Furthermore, it is easier to transform the existing infrastructure of an industrial enterprise into digital one with the help of special IoT platform using the relevant engineering software.

The article is dedicated to the consideration of hacking growth theory in the context of technological breakthrough of Russian agricultural machinery industry with the use of engineering marketing approach. Taking into account the results of analysis of Russian agricultural machinery dynamics in recent years, the prospects and opportunities for overcoming current problems (in particular, insufficient competitiveness and technological gap) are discussed on the basis of investigation of existing approaches to technology business development. The solution is suggested which consists in creating interdisciplinary growth teams capable of developing and implementing relevant innovative solutions, as well as providing rapid spread of changes. The issues of internal transformation necessary for the adjustment of Russian enterprises to the changing external environment in the context of knowledge-based economy development are considered in the paper.