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If you think growing leave is easy , reckon again .
Lettuce is n’t the existence ’s most challenging harvest , but as any Fannie Farmer knows , there are slew of problem that pop up between planting and harvest . The gamut runs from pestis to pathogen and rainwater — both too little and too much .
To shield the tender jet from the brutal earthly concern , many growers have taken their crops indoors — sprawling greenhouses or humming warehouses have become the novel domicile for all sort of harvest . But demons lurk indoors , too , and recently they ’ve been of the profit - and - release variety . More losses than profits , actually .
Indoor farming startups were darlings of the startup world in recent years , with their tech - forward focus drawing about $ 3 billion Charles Frederick Worth of investment from 2012 to 2022 , agree toCrunchbase . Yet , in the last twelvemonth or so , funding to the sector has droop : AppHarvestandFifth Seasonhave both filed for bankruptcy ; Iron Ox laid offnearly half its staff ; andBowery Farmingwent through round of layoff and saw its valuation slashed by Fidelity .
With headwind like those , it would seem like the sector is headed for a dust bowl .
There are some green shoots , though . Hippo Harvestrecently raise a $ 21 million Series B on the back of its repurposed storage warehouse golem , TechCrunch has alone learned .
What ’s more , the pear-shaped values the startup , post - money , at $ 145 million , accord to PitchBook — a healthy footstep up from its old $ 42 million rating . The round was led by Standard Investments with involvement from Congruent Ventures , Amazon Climate Pledge Fund , Hawthorne Food Ventures and Energy Impact Partners .
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In some ways , Hippo Harvest is like its contender : It ’s hoping that it can develop intellectual nourishment more efficiently using less land and water supply . But what sets it apart in this space is the fact that it ’s more of a automaton startup than an indoor husbandry troupe .
Many indoor farming company rely on automation . calculator control everything from heat and humidity to nutrient levels in the aquacultural system . tray full of ripe produce zip along tracks so they can be reap .
“ If you go into an Amazon storage warehouse 15 years ago , you would see something that wait actually a lot like the glasshouse today : pneumatics , gantry systems a lot of fixed process automation , ” Hippo Harvest ’s CEO Eitan Marder - Eppstein tell TechCrunch .
But Amazon ’s warehouse look completely different now . automaton scamper about , move intact shelf of merchandise from one place to another , optimizing the layout depending on demand .
Those robots have become so wide used that they ’ve become commoditized , Marder - Eppstein said . “ We saw this opportunity to say , ‘ Hey , what if we took those robots and turn them into tractor for our greenhouses ? ’ ” he enjoin .
It ’s a decision that would shape the entire society . “ We give way all the way back to how nurseries used to be managed . It ’s really old - school , with a person with a watering can walking around . But now we ’ve got a robot that can do that . ”
The automaton also allow Hippo Harvest to ply more experiments and glean data for its machine learning algorithms . When Marder - Eppstein and his co - founder Wim Meeussen bulge hit the books greenhouses , he say they preserve come up against one problem : “ These system operate on on these large recirculating bathymetry loops , ” Marder - Eppstein said .
The share loop meant they did n’t know how much food individual plants were meet , and they could n’t keep each flora ’s microbiome separate from the others ( works rely hard on their microbiome to make the most of the nutrient available to them ) . Such a setup would have badly limit how many experiment they could run .
So instead of plant sitting in the same shared hydroponic loop , Hippo Harvest places them in case-by-case cells within three - foot - square toes modules . That separation not only allowed the glasshouse to test more variable quantity , but it also unknowingly solved a problem that vexes hydroponic greenhouse operator : pathogens that swiftly spread through the shared loop and kill an intact crop .
In a Hippo Harvest glasshouse , modules of plants sit down atop a control grid of posts and are part by small aisle . The robots waver their fashion under the flat , popping up in the aisles to deliver water and nutrients , and to pull together data . When the flora are fledged , they lift the flat and carry them to warehouse operators for harvest .
Hippo Harvest is sticking with greenhouses , eschew the vertical farm in an attempt to save on cap and operational disbursement . ( Vertical farms require more intensive light , heating and ventilation . )
The company says it can grow greens using up to 92 % less weewee , 55 % less fertilizer and no pesticides compared with traditional agriculture , though it does n’t disclose the carbon footprint of its operation . Currently , its greenhouses are heated by rude gas , though Marder - Eppstein say the company is commit to be last zero by 2040 .
Hippo Harvest ’s green goods is presently for cut-rate sale in California through Amazon Fresh and at some smaller entrepot throughout the state of matter , include Mar - Val and Gus ’s Community Market . The party design to continue focused on the Golden State while it habituate its Series B funding to scale surgical process .
Should Hippo Harvest succeed , it ’ll be bucking the movement , no doubt to its investors ’ delight . Indoor agriculture has hit a rough patch , but its potency has proven too enticing for some to discount . Indoor farms promise to lose weight water system employment , which is no little feat in an era of megadroughts , and to bring green goods yield nearer to homes and eating place , trimming transportation costs and emission .
Now , all they have to do is rein in costs , and Hippo Harvest is hoping its repurposed robots will do just that .
