Orchard Robotics, the company enabling precision crop management
with robots and AI, announced today their $3.8M raise, across a
seed round led by General Catalyst, and a pre-seed led by Contrary.
In this oversubscribed round, they are joined by Humba Ventures,
Soma Capital, Correlation Ventures, and VU Venture Partners, Ben
Taft’s Genius Ventures, along with notable angel investors Howard
Lerman, Joshua Browder, Rory and Kieran O’Reilly, and many others.
The company has engineered AI-driven camera systems designed to
be affixed onto any farm vehicle, collecting precise data
(including fruit count, size, color, growth rate, and more)
pertaining to the fruit on each individual tree. Currently, the
company’s technology is used by many of the largest fruit growers
in the nation to maximize yield and quality in the field, and make
strategic supply chain decisions post-harvest.
Orchards can have millions of trees, growing hundreds of
millions of fruit, spanning thousands of acres. Yet historically,
farmers have been forced to rely on small and imprecise sample
sizes (for instance, counting fruit on just 10 of the 10,000 trees
in a block) to make critical crop management decisions that affect
the outcome of their whole farm.
And every tree is unique, needing specific inputs, treatments,
and care all season long in order to produce the best fruit. Across
millions of trees, the current practices of imprecise, homogenous
treatments lead to inefficient resource usage, costly labor, and a
large loss of potential crop value.
“Our mission at Orchard Robotics is to help farmers produce more
food for the world, more profitability, efficiently, and
sustainably. This starts with giving farmers the precision data
they need to do what they do best. Growing better fruit begins with
knowing what you’re growing. Nearly every decision on the farm,
from pruning to spraying to thinning, is made in an effort to
maximize fruit yield and quality”, said Wu. “Our cameras image
trees from bud to bloom to harvest, and use advanced computer
vision and machine learning models we’ve developed to collect
precise data about hundreds of millions of fruit. This is a
monumental step forward from traditional methods, which rely on
manually-collected samples of maybe 100 fruits. By giving farmers
total insight into what they’re growing, coupled with the ability
to act on our real-time recommendations, we’re accelerating the
adoption of precision crop management.”
Founded at Cornell University by Charles Wu, the company’s
technology has been validated to consistently provide accurate
counts when properly calibrated. Today, the company aids farmers in
precision pruning, thinning, and spraying for targeted crop load
management that reduces labor costs, while ensuring each tree gets
what it needs to thrive. And the impact of the company’s technology
stretches far beyond the field, helping packhouses and marketers
gain detailed insights into their supply chain through early-season
yield estimates, well before the first fruit comes off the tree.
“Beyond our advanced camera systems, our focus at Orchard Robotics
also centers around our FruitScope OS. We recognize that data is
only useful if our farmers can actually use it. Which is why, in
collaboration with our growers, we’ve built FruitScope to be the
industry-leading crop load management platform, where farmers can
not only view all of their orchard data, but more importantly, put
it into action on their farms.”
“Orchard Robotics has a bold vision to transform the future of
farming and bring digitization and automation to farms,” said Niko
Bonatsos, Managing Director, and Max Rimpel, partner, at General
Catalyst. “The experience of the team, early success with large
customers, partnership approach, and their data-first platform
stood out to us, and we look forward to helping the company
modernize a legacy industry for the fruit industry and beyond.”
Wu, who serves as CEO of the company, was also recently
announced as a member of the newest class of Thiel Fellows. On his
selection to the program, Alex Handy, Director of the Thiel
Fellowship, said “By pushing crop yield beyond previously imagined
limits, Charlie is paving the way for a future where farmers will
be truly omniscient, understanding their yields at the cellular
level. Orchard's transformative approach will render the
Agricultural Revolution a mere prelude to a future that truly
reflects the skills, talent, and passion of America's farmers.”
Following a successful 2023 growing season, this investment
enables the company to scale their team and operations to better
serve existing and future customers across larger acreages, while
bringing precision crop management to all parts of the farm.
If you are a grower or packer interested in our technology, or
just want to learn more about what we can do for your operation,
sign up for a live demo today. For more information, visit
orchard-robotics.com.
About Orchard Robotics:Founded in 2022,
Orchard Robotics enables precision crop management for fruit
farmers. They have engineered a vehicle-mounted, AI-powered camera
system that gathers precision data about the fruit on every tree.
Their industry-leading Orchard OS software platform lets farmers
act on it by integrating with existing farm operations. The
company’s technology is used by many of the largest fruit growers
in the nation to maximize yield and quality in the field, while
making strategic supply chain decisions post-harvest. For more
information, visit orchard-robotics.com.
About General Catalyst:General Catalyst is a
venture capital firm that invests in powerful, positive change that
endures — for our entrepreneurs, our investors, our people, and
society. We support founders with a long-term view who challenge
the status quo, partnering with them from seed to growth stage and
beyond to build companies that withstand the test of time. With
offices in San Francisco, Palo Alto, New York City, London, Berlin
and Boston, the firm has helped support the growth of businesses
such as: Airbnb, Deliveroo, Guild, Gusto, Hubspot, Illumio,
Lemonade, Livongo, Oscar, Samsara, Snap, Stripe, and Warby Parker.
For more: www.generalcatalyst.com.
Contact info: contact@orchard-robotics.com