A Jeff Bezos-Backed Vertical Farm is Coming to the Seattle Area
A Jeff Bezos-Backed Vertical Farm is Coming to the Seattle Area
Plenty will open a 100,000-square-foot indoor farm in Kent in the first half of 2018.
By Casey Coombs – Staff Writer, Puget Sound Business Journal
Nov 3, 2017
Indoor farming startup Plenty is building its first full-scale farm in the Seattle area.
Plenty snagged $200 million in Series B funding in July from investors including SoftBank's Vision Fund, Alphabet (Nasdaq: GOOGL) Chairman Eric Schmidt and Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) founder and CEO Jeff Bezos' Bezos Expeditions.
Expected to open in the first half of 2018 in Kent, Plenty's farm will employ a workforce of indoor farming engineers, organic growers and operations experts.
“Seattle’s emphasis on delicious, healthy food and energy and water efficiency makes the area a natural fit for our next Plenty farm,” Plenty CEO and co-founder Matt Barnard said. “At nearly 100,000 square feet, Seattle will be home to our first full scale farm and help set the standard by which our global farm network makes locally-grown, backyard-quality produce accessible to everyone. We’re excited about what’s next and look forward to building the Seattle team.”
The produce will be available to local Seattle and Vancouver BC-area consumers beginning in mid-2018.
Using LED lighting, micro-sensors and big data processing, the company's indoor farming technology aims to help solve global fresh produce shortages.
Plenty farms use one percent of the water and fraction of the land of conventional agriculture.
Plenty’s first field-scale farm is located in South San Francisco and will start delivering produce to local Bay Area customers within hours of harvest by the end of 2017.
The Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) Redmond headquarters campus features similar lettuce-growing technology:
“Seattle’s emphasis on delicious, healthy food and energy and water efficiency makes the area a natural fit for ou
Microsoft grows hydroponic lettuce in Redmond
Mark Freeman, senior manager of global dining services at Microsoft, stands with lettuce growing in a hydroponic pyramids in Building 121's Cafe 121 on Microsoft's campus in Redmond.