AgFunder Network Partners

Category: Robotics & Automation

Pest control sensor startup Spotta raises $1.18m seed funding

August 3, 2020

The team at Spotta wants to enable a lighter use of pesticides by building networks of accurate real-time insect detectors.

Taranis banks $30m Series C with tech giants Hitachi, Micron among new investors

July 21, 2020

The round’s large close amid Covid-19 further cements Taranis’ reputation as a dogged drone survivor in one of the most scrutinized areas of agtech.

Chinese food delivery giant pumps $14m into robot maker PuduTech

July 7, 2020

PuduTech and Meituan Dianping will collaborate on robotics and catering digitization, and explore opportunities in “localized lifestyle services.”

Funding for agri-drone companies in a time of corona: futurism or folly?

July 6, 2020

Recent funding for remote-sensing companies like AgroScout could signal a revival for providers of agri-drone technology.

Alibaba tie-up brings Beyond Meat to Chinese shoppers

July 2, 2020

For the first time, home cooks in China will be able to purchase Beyond Meat’s plant-based products off the shelf, starting with Alibaba’s ‘new retail’ supermarket chain Freshippo.

Want to build Asia’s new agrifood ecosystem? Apply to Singapore Food Bowl now!

June 4, 2020

Singapore Food Bowl is the new online program from GROW, the Asia-Pacific agrifoodtech accelerator by AgFunder. Applications close in 4 days – so hurry!

The Greeneye team testing their AI weed detect and spray platform

Syngenta invests in $7m seed round for Israeli autonomous chemical reduction tech Greeneye

May 27, 2020

Trials already indicate how a precision method like Greeneye’s can reduce a farmer’s herbicide usage by 65‒92%, according to Greeneye.

SoftBank reports $24bn loss on startup investments, with agrifood performance unclear

May 19, 2020

SoftBank was among the world’s most active investors in the agrifoodtech space last year, according to AgFunder research.

Farm Tech investment up 370% in 6 years. How will Covid-19 impact 2020 trends?

April 30, 2020

Come rain, shine, or coronavirus, there’s just no halting the AgFunder Research mothership. AgFunder just unfurled its new 2020 Farmtech Investment Report — a data-driven snapshot of global investment in startups building technologies for the farm.

Covid-19 is accelerating inevitable food trends but which changes will stick?

April 29, 2020

The news cycle for the entire Covid-19 pandemic crisis has been awash with crises in the food industry, forcing various tech providers to step up to the challenge. But which will be left wanting when the virus eventually subsides?

Future Food Earth Day Special: Digging into dairy sustainability with Danone & Connecterra

April 22, 2020

In this Earth Day special of the Future Food podcast, I speak to Cees Jan Hollander, global director of farm relations, and Connecterra CEO Yasir Khokhar about their efforts to make the dairy sector more sustainable.

Restaurant tech offers consumers convenience, but headaches for operators

March 26, 2020

Consumers are demanding more digital offerings from restaurants, but new technologies are creating unexpected pain points for operators.

Wisdom (and wallets) of the crowd: Small Robot Company closes crowdfunding campaign at £2.1m

February 13, 2020

The VC firm 7percent Ventures is confirmed as lead investor, having plowed in £200,000. By the time of close, a total of 1,759 investors had backed the round.

Zap! This UK startup just raised €6.5m to commit electricide on weeds

January 22, 2020

RootWave owes its electrical spark of inspiration to years of earlier efforts from the CEO’s father who had been trying out ways to electrify weeds in the 1980s

A Swiss raclette-cutting robot wows CES 2020 in Las Vegas

January 17, 2020

One of the robo-stars of this year’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas was a slightly wacky invention from Switzerland: a robot that has been

‘Vive la AgRobolution!’ Naïo Tech raises €14m Series A to build more agri-robots

January 9, 2020

Naïo co-founder Gaëtan Séverac is bullish about the imminent and radical adoption of agri-robots; his company placed signs at its recent event calling for an “agrobolution.”

Protifarm raises Series B to scale robot-grown beetle “tofu”

December 12, 2019

The Netherlands-based alt-protein company is one of a small number catching investor interest for farming insects for human consumption rather than for animal feed.

Bonjour, robots! A list of agri-robots whirring round FIRA in Toulouse next week

December 5, 2019

Next week I’ll be singing au revoir Londres, bonjour Toulouse! as I fly to France for the International Forum of Agricultural Robotics, known by its French acronym of FIRA.

SoftBank-backed Accel Robotics is blending online & physical with check-out free technology

December 5, 2019

So far, checkout-free technologies appear to be using the same recipe of technology: will they be forced to diversify or die?

AgTech Exits: Raven Industries acquires two driverless tractor startups

November 7, 2019

Smart AG offers a driverless tractor technology to help farmers upgrade existing equipment to tackle time and labor challenges while DOT designs and manufactures ready-made autonomous equipment.