AI Is Learning To Understand How Vegetables Taste

By Jennifer Kite-Powell

July 20, 2021

With the global demand for food escalating, vertical farms are becoming a critical component of agriculture's future. They use robotics, machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) to automate farming and perfect the growing of greens and vegetables. With steady growth, the vertical farming market was had an estimated value of $4.4 billion in 2019 and is expected to reach $15.7 billion by 2025.

Fifth Season is a vertical farm in Pittsburgh that uses super-stack software and robotics to run their fully automated farming systems. And, by combining big data and AI, they have created the optimal grow recipe that determines the best flavor for the plants they grow.

"The role of AI in determining flavor is to leverage big data and AI to ensure you achieve the target flavor — sweetness, spiciness, bitterness, total degree of flavor and texture," said Austin Webb, CEO of Fifth Season.

"Our plant's individualized grow recipe is the unique mix of the different LED lights," said Webb. "The plants go through the grow room with a QR code that communicates that plant's route and tells the automated system where each plant needs to be throughout the process."

Webb says their super stack system, which serves as 'the brain' of the vertical farm maps, maps out each plant's route through the grow room based on its grow recipe and then moves the plants where they need to go.

"We use AI and data to find improvements in all aspects of crop quality, even beyond what humans think they know about flavor profiles. We call this proactive, deterministic growing compared to traditional farming, including greenhouse growing, where you have to be reactive based on weather and sunlight conditions," said Webb. "We then leverage human/chef feedback on what tastes the best and what texture is best and [..] combine that qualitative data with the 26K quantitative data points for every tray of greens per lifecycle."

"From there, we tweak our grow recipes to build the best flavor. For some vegetables, like tomatoes, experts have leveraged Brix scores, but [..] we measure flavor quality based on these factors: sweetness, spiciness, bitterness, the total degree of flavor, texture and color," said Webb. "Humans don't need to guess what iron content or Brix score is best; the brain in our farms can do that. Humans tell the grain what tastes best, and the brain will compute and tweak the grow recipes from there."

Darryn Keiller, CEO and founder of WayBeyond, says that to impact flavor, you either have to change the genetics of the crop or alter the existing biochemical profile.

"For example, growers can impact flavor by adjusting light and nutrients, which can then enhance the texture (crunch, thickness) or flavor (increased sweetness or bitterness)," said Keiller. "Once you determine the key characteristics you want in a crop, you then use machine learning or AI to automate and optimize the production process for consistent growth and be responsive to changing consumer preferences."

"Currently, vertical farms utilize seed stock bred for outdoor farming. Using AI technology, they can create their breeding stock (or lines) better suited for indoor environments. It's about refining your research and development and creating genetics perfect for your environment and management practices while ensuring continuous improvement of commercial production. The potential is huge."

Webb adds that many indoor growers sought to build an outdoor farming system that can thrive indoors; however, Fifth Season chose to apply smart manufacturing principles to agriculture that would enable them to grow food in a new way.

"We grow more than 15K pounds a week of fresh food with 90% less water than what would be required to grow that amount of fresh food on a traditional outdoor farm - and that is done on a footprint of just 25,000 square feet," added Webb.

Webb believes that scaling viable vertical farming operations that can crack code on both the technology and the consumer experience to deliver consistently fresh, nutritious and clean produce changes the consumer shopping significantly.

"It changes our entire definition of what fresh can and should taste like; it changes the ease of access and availability and convenience to fresh food, which brings so much value to consumers," said Webb. "It's another avenue for shoppers to access the freshest, highest-quality food at retail with produce that has a much longer shelf life than we're accustomed.”

Lead Photo: Greens leaving the grow environment on route to harvesting and packaging in Fifth Season's vertical farm in Pittsburgh.

No Sun, No Soil, And Robot Farmers: Is This Tomorrow’s Food Crop?

By Megan Backhouse

July 2, 2021

Even by the unconventional standards of modern-day urban agriculture, Geert Hendrix’s set-up is unorthodox. It is in an Alphington warehouse, with no windows and no soil, and is filled with the most diminutive of crops.

Tiny purple radish stems, miniscule basil leaves and microscopic watercress seedlings are the heavy hitters here. Their stems strain towards LED lights and their roots stretch down through hemp fibre and coconut coir into fish-tanks.

Geert Hendrix with one of his indoor growing systems. CREDIT: JUSTIN MCMANUS

Other leafy greens are growing on illuminated shelves that have nutrient-rich water recirculating inside them. Lettuces are being cultivated – in a sealed glass cabinet – on nothing but air and a regular misting of another nutrient solution. Other plants are tended by robot.

Freewheeling, this place is not. Space is carefully allocated, lighting is monitored and close tabs are kept on waste. Nothing is left to chance. Hendrix, part of a growing band of people working to make food production more sustainable and reliable, is using his indoor farm at the Melbourne Innovation Centre to help turn traditional methods of food production on their head.

He says the range of growing systems – some of which are at more experimental stages than others – is predominantly aimed at showing high-school students what is possible.

Purple radishes growing in trays of hemp fibre atop a fish tank. CREDIT: JUSTIN MCMANUS

As anyone growing vegetables as microgreens in trays of soil in a sunny spot in their kitchen will tell you, growing baby plants doesn’t have to be high-tech. You need to be rigorous with your twice-daily rinsing, but then, in little more than a week, you will invariably have a good yield of aromatic, nutritionally dense miniature greens at the ready.

Hendrix says it’s the very ease and speed of growing microgreens that makes them such a powerful educational tool. “I see them as a gateway to help people become full-spectrum farmers in the future.” He expects that, over the next 10 years, big shifts in agricultural processes will create new opportunities for farming, and he wants to inspire young people to take advantage of them.

Lead photo: Lettuces growing in a sealed glass cabinet. CREDIT: JUSTIN MCMANUS

Robots Take Vertical Farming To New Heights

Braddock, Pa., Is Where Andrew Carnegie First Mass-Produced Steel. The City, Now One-Tenth Its Former size, Is Home To A New Kind Of Industry: Robotic Farms That Grow Greens Inside Buildings.

June 28, 2021

David Kidd

A decades-long decline of industry in Braddock has left the western Pennsylvania town in ruins. Ten miles upriver from Pittsburgh in the Mon (Monongahela) Valley, most of the city’s factories, businesses and homes were abandoned long ago and leveled. Among the ruins, a sprawling steel mill, built by Andrew Carnegie in 1874, is still producing slabs of steel, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It’s stained blue walls and maze of giant, rust-colored pipes and vents stand in contrast to the brand-new, block-long, gleaming white structure directly across the street. The mill’s neighbor is Fifth Season, a vertical farm growing greens indoors by stacking racks of plants on top of each other.

Fifth Season is the brainchild of brothers Austin and Brac Webb, and co-founder Austin Lawrence. “We view vertical farming as really a smart manufacturing system,” says Austin Webb. “We just happen to manufacture living organisms.”

The partners consider their fledgling enterprise as more than a means to feed people, but also a chance to work with a community in need. Almost none of the old steel plant’s employees live in Braddock. Conversely, everyone hired to work at Fifth Season lives close by and in the surrounding communities. “We’re creating a workforce of the future,” Webb says. “It’s an entirely new ag-manufacturing job that hasn’t existed before.”

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Since the collapse of the steel industry in Braddock, the borough has struggled to attract new business and residents.(David Kidd/Governing)

Automated City Farming
Two shifts of 20 people oversee operations at the vertical farm. And like the steel maker across the road, the work never stops. Dressed in blue scrubs and lab coats, with heads covered and gloves on their hands, workers inside the plant look more like medical research professionals than farmers. The entire process, from seed to harvest, is controlled robotically. “What we have built is the industry first, and industry only, end-to-end automated platform,” says Webb.

Fifth Season’s proprietary software allows efficiencies otherwise not attainable. Spinach, arugula and other greens move around the 60,000-square-foot facility in plastic trays, each with its own unique ID. Sensors are constantly monitoring everything from nutrient mix, carbon dioxide levels and light spectrum, in order to ensure that the greens follow their prescribed grow recipe. Every plant can be traced from any point in the process, at any time.

Webb is quick to tout the advantages of vertical farming. Fifth Season uses up to 95 percent less water and 98 percent less land than conventional farming. Water from the municipal system is filtered and proprietary nutrients added before getting to the plants directly through their roots. “It means you can replicate any form of soil environment,” he says. Whatever water is not used by the plants is retreated and recirculated, with nutrients added as needed. A peat mix is used to support the roots, but all the nutrients are in the water, not the “soil.”

“We use no herbicides and no pesticides,” Webb says. “And that’s because we have hermetically sealed environments.” The possibility of contamination is all but eliminated. Fifth Season recently received a perfect score from the Safe Quality Food (SQF) program, an international, independent body that certifies food safety management. “The second time in 25 years they gave 100 percent,” he says.

With only their faces exposed, employees work among the various conveyor belts that crisscross the high, white-walled rooms of Fifth Season’s production floor. But there are no humans in the adjacent grow room, where tightly spaced racks, supporting trays of plants, are stacked 30 feet high, bathed in an otherworldly purple-magenta glow. The dramatic color comes from the LEDs that replicate the most useful parts of the spectrum of sunlight. “You can’t control the sun,” Says Webb. “But what you can control are LEDs.”

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Fifth Season’s proprietary systems allow more plants to be grown in less space. The purple-magenta LED lighting replicates the most useful parts of the spectrum of sunlight, improving growth of the greens.(Fifth Season)

Every few minutes, a robot glides forward and back along a raised guideway that runs down the center of the room, dividing the stacks in half. The machine is not much more than a plain box, just a few feet tall. A metal beam rises from its back, extending to the ceiling. Its task is to place and remove trays of plants, taking its instructions from the all-knowing software. Because they are so tightly spaced, more trays can be stacked on top of each other, resulting in greater production.

“Compared to some other vertical farms out there, we have a lot more density,” says Webb. “We’re able to have more racks that grow inside the same space.” Moving trays is a task well-suited to a machine. Not only does the robot fit into places no human could, it always knows where every tray of greens should be, and for how long.

Vertical Farming Comes to Braddock
After a five-year career in finance, Austin Webb enrolled in an MBA program at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. “I believe that robotics will possibly disrupt every industry in the world,” he says. “And so I went to C.M.U., specifically because it’s the No. 1 school in computers, science and robotics.”

There he met Austin Lawrence, who shared his interest in controlled environment agriculture. Together they visited a few vertical farms, coming to the conclusion that what was needed was an entire robotic platform, something the two of them could not accomplish on their own. Webb’s brother Brac, a self-described engineer and entrepreneur, was soon recruited to help. Their new business was incorporated in 2016, initially as RoBotany, which later morphed into Fifth Season.

With financial backing in hand, the partners looked for a place to build, quickly settling on nearby Braddock. They broke ground in May of 2019, were installing equipment less than a year later and were at full production before the end of 2020. “I think there’s a lot of opportunity for resurgence in a place like this,” says Webb. “A lot of folks that stayed are passionate around Braddock being able to grow and thrive and we want to be a part of that.”

In the foreground, Fifth Season’s new structure stands in contrast to the steel plant behind it that still dominates the town.(David KIDD/Governing)

Andrew Carnegie’s mill was the first of many that would proliferate in the Mon Valley, making it the nation’s steel capital. The churches, schools, stores and restaurants that served the town’s 20,000 inhabitants are mostly gone now. Shops and services are few and far between for the 2,000 that remain. “The nearest grocery store is up the hill, two towns over,” says Braddock Mayor Chardae Jones. “And most people don’t have cars.” It’s a hot day in June when a few of the locals gather in a brand-new park along Braddock Avenue. Everyone agrees the park is nice, but it’s no consolation for the hospital that used to stand on the site.

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Many years ago, steelworkers and their families lived close to the mill.(David Kidd/Governing)

A few blocks away, an ever-present din still emanates from Carnegie’s steel mill, and a parade of trucks continues to roll past the boarded-up stores and empty lots that line the borough’s main thoroughfare. “We have a lot of vacant buildings,” says Mayor Jones. “That’s our biggest issue.” But there are signs of a revival among the ruins.

Present Day Braddock
Against the backdrop of empty and dilapidated storefronts, “The Ohringer,” a former furniture store built in the streamline moderne style of the 1940s, has recently been completely rebuilt and modernized as apartments and studio space for artists. Applicants are expected to present their work for review and answer a few questions, one of which is “why are you interested in becoming part of Braddock’s resurgence?”

Not only does Braddock lay claim to Andrew Carnegie’s first steel mill, but also the first Carnegie library, dedicated in 1889. Narrowly escaping demolition in the 1970s, the impressive stone structure is today undergoing a comprehensive restoration and modernization. Bright yellow notices of this year’s street sweeping schedule are affixed to telephone poles near the library and all over town, an indication that the local government is still functioning.

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A repurposed furniture store now provides updated living and studio space to area artists.(David Kidd/Governing)

Further up the avenue, more official-looking signs are attached to random telephone poles. “NOTICE, WRITE MORE LOVE LETTERS” says one. “NOTICE, LOVE IS FREE,” says another. The signs were placed there, unofficially, by Gisele Fetterman, wife of former mayor and current Lt. Governor John Fetterman. Among her many initiatives to improve the lives of people in Braddock, she founded the Free Store nine years ago, a place where “surplus and donated goods are received and redistributed to neighbors in need.”

Fifth Season is a regular contributor to the Free Store, having recently given them a new refrigerator and donating 100 pre-packaged salads every Thursday. “We’re treated like we’re a customer,” says Gisele Fetterman. “We’re not getting things that didn’t sell, or surplus. Our families get to come in and choose. They can feel like they are at a grocery store. There is great dignity in the process of being able to choose.”

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Offering “produce grown in soil by humans in Braddock,” workers at Braddock Farms do it the old-fashioned way.(David Kidd/Governing)

There are more signs along Braddock Avenue. “BE ALERT: VEGETABLES AHEAD.” Another simply says “TURNIPS.” Back in 2007, when John Fetterman was the mayor, he encouraged a nonprofit group of community gardeners to establish a farm in Braddock. Bisected by a side street, the organic farm has expanded to a little less than an acre in size, growing greens, tomatoes, onions, peppers and eggplant. This is Nick Lubecki’s fourth year as manager of the farm. “We’re here in Braddock, so the people in Braddock are our main focus,” he says. “We want to be useful.”

At best, the little farm on Braddock Avenue can produce 13 plantings of greens in a year. It is entirely different from the computer-controlled, machine-driven, non-stop production that takes place a few blocks away at Fifth Season, where a half-acre indoors can produce the equivalent of nearly 100 acres of farmland. But higher yields don’t matter as much if a significant portion is ultimately lost in transit to the table.

Serving a Market
Localized food production means less spoilage and waste. “If it takes anywhere from five to eight days to go from California to Pittsburgh, you’ve just lost five to eight days of shelf life,” says Austin Webb. Most of what Fifth Season produces is consumed in the Pittsburgh area. “The day after it was cut, not 10 days later.” Their ready-to-eat salads can be purchased at a local supermarket chain, or delivered directly to the consumer at home, a direct response to the pandemic. Local restaurants, hospitals and universities are also customers.

Convinced they have successfully demonstrated the viability of their proprietary technology, the three partners are looking to expand beyond western Pennsylvania. “We can build these anywhere… even larger than what we have here today,” says Austin Webb. “And we don’t have to re-create the wheel. It’s not like it would take us another five years.”

Conversations are already taking place about licensing the technology, proceeding in partnership with someone else, or going it alone. “That will allow us to build a facility just like we built in Braddock, in other parts of the U.S., and other parts of the world, even faster.”

A Job You Can Walk to
Andrew Carnegie built his steel mill in the Mon Valley because he needed the river, the raw materials, and access to labor. His plant was expressly designed to use the Bessemer Process, the first method to inexpensively mass-produce steel. Nearly 150 years later, the Webb brothers and their partner Austin Lawrence chose the exact same location to showcase their own new manufacturing technology and to fill a need in the community. “Knowing that we could build these anywhere, we wanted to build in Braddock because we knew that we could create jobs,” says Austin Webb. “That we could create this new workforce of the future.”

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Employed since January, John Davis lives less than a block away from Fifth Season. “I have family in Braddock. They’re very happy I’ve got a job.”(David Kidd/Governing)

Braddock resident John Davis may or may not think of himself as part of the workforce of the future. But he’s happy to have a good job. Covered head to toe in his surgical outfit, he works in the seeding department at Fifth Season, a job he’s held since January. He’s lived here for 20 years, and this is the first job he’s had that didn’t involve a commute. He walks to work from his house, half a block away.

Davis is 32 years old and anxious to put the past behind him. “To have a job that you like, where you live, it’s comfortable,” he says. “And you can see that this is going to change Braddock for the better because it gives the residents jobs and new innovations. It’s going to bring life.”

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While awaiting their fate, many of Braddock’s empty buildings provide space for murals and artwork.(David Kidd/Governing)

Lead photo: Greens leave the grow room at robot farm Fifth Season, ready for harvest. (Fifth Season)

Tags: Economic DevelopmentFood AssistanceTechnology

David Kidd

David Kidd is a photojournalist and storyteller for Governing. He can be reached at dkidd@governing.com.

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Farm Tech Startup Iron Ox Appoints Impossible Foods and Tesla Veteran Rachel Konrad as First Independent Board Member

-- Konrad, who spent the past five years at Impossible Foods, joins the board of Iron Ox during a period of rapid manufacturing scale-up and retail expansion.

-- Iron Ox growing facilities use advanced robotics to precisely cultivate perfect, nutritious produce by giving each plant the specific attention it needs, and then getting it on a store shelf nearby within about a day of harvest.

-- The Series B-stage company, whose products are already a breakout seller in California, is also hiring plant scientists, engineers, greenhouse operators, and roboticists.

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SAN CARLOS, Calif., June 10, 2021 /PRNewswire/ -- Iron Ox, a farming innovation company with deep expertise in robotics and artificial intelligence, has appointed former Impossible Foods and Tesla executive Rachel Konrad as its first independent board member. This appointment further demonstrates the food tech startup's growth trajectory as they scale up operations and expand their commercial footprint.  

Iron Ox, which launched the world's first autonomous farm, has an industry-leading intellectual property portfolio to automate farming and produce that's fresher, cleaner, and locally grown. Thanks to the company's groundbreaking robotics, Iron Ox farms require 90% less water than traditional farms — generating 30 times more produce per acre of land.

Konrad joins Iron Ox after spending the past five years as Chief Communications Officer and a member of the senior leadership team at Impossible Foods, reporting directly to CEO Pat Brown. She previously held senior management roles at Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi and Tesla, where she reported directly to Elon Musk as the company scaled up operations.

"We can't solve our planet's climate crisis without radical changes to the way we make food," said Konrad, who lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and enjoys cooking for her family and hiking with her rescue German Shepherd. "Iron Ox's intellectual property portfolio can usher in a new era of farming that produces food sustainably and ethically. But honestly, I was sold after my first whiff of Iron Ox basil."

"Rachel understands the unique power of disruptive startups to shift entire industries and force even the most entrenched incumbents to do the right thing for people and the planet," said Brandon Alexander, Iron Ox CEO and Co-Founder. "Her unique perspective will help Iron Ox refine and execute our ambitious strategy. As our first independent board member, we expect Rachel to help us set a new standard for inclusive governance in corporate America."

The Series B-stage company operates farms in Northern California and recently broke ground on a new 535,000 sq. ft. indoor farm in Lockhart, Texas. Today, California consumers can buy Iron Ox food throughout California at Whole Foods and at San Francisco Bay Area's upscale Biancchini's markets. Sales in Texas are expected to begin in late 2021. 

The company is also hiring plant scientists, engineers, greenhouse operators and roboticists who are passionate about solving food insecurity, which is at the root of our environmental and public health crises.

For more information, and to view the job openings, visit the Iron Ox jobs page.

About Iron Ox:
Iron Ox is a farming innovation company with deep expertise in robotics and artificial intelligence, and a vision to solve global climate through food. Their approach redesigns every step of the farming process, achieving levels of precision that are impossible through traditional farming. Iron Ox produce is both local and sustainable by design, greatly reducing systemic food waste and minimizing the ecological impact of farming. For more information, visit www.ironox.com.

SOURCE: Iron Ox

ironox.com

Robotic Warehouse Farms Will Save The World

by Elle Griffin

April 13, 20211

Four years ago, Ritch Wood was looking for a better way to grow plants. As the CEO of global skincare company Nu Skin, he ran into ingredient shortages every winter when fields went dormant―and when he moved grow operations to the equator he ran into water and land shortages, along with a host of quality control issues. 

Nu Skin needed reliable, quality ingredients for their skincare products. But farming was too unpredictable an industry. “If there was a way to grow indoors,” he thought, “and be able to do that 24 hours a day, 365 days a year―if we could guarantee that it was grown without any herbicides or pesticides and in a sustainable way that uses less water and land―that would be really helpful.”

At the time, controlled-environment agriculture (CEA) was in its infancy and grow-light technology had yet to take a turn for the more affordable. When he learned of an agricultural system that promised to use a fraction of the land and water used by traditional agriculture methods and had the potential to make it more affordable, Wood made an investment. 

Nu Skin paid $3 million for 70 percent of the company and rights to its IP―and Grōv Technologies was born. 

Grōv grass grown in the Olympus machine at the Bateman Mosida Farms. Photo from Grōv Technologies

Controlled-environment agriculture is on the rise

The theory behind CEA is that by controlling the environment in which it grows, we can control everything about a plant and what it grows into by micro-tweaking one of a thousand different characteristics―including temperature, humidity, light duration, light wavelength, dissolved oxygen in the water, and carbon dioxide saturation in the air. By tweaking the growing cycle, we can control the caloric content as well as the nutrient content and density of the plant. 

“What we’ve learned through controlled-environment agriculture,” Benjamin Swan, co-founder and CEO at Sustenir in Singapore, once told National Geographic, “[is] we can actually emphasize certain characteristics of the plants. So, without using GMO, we can make our kale softer, we can actually make it sweet.” 

The theoretical use cases for this technology are endless―from being able to grow in places where water is scarce (like in much of Africa), or where water is overly abundant (like Hawaii), or in places where labor is scarce (like in parts of Asia), or even in places that have long winters (like Northern Europe). Theoretically, we could have grow towers in every town and feed the whole of it no matter its natural environment. 

We could even grow those foods to those cities’ exact nutritional needs―more vitamin D-rich foods in wintery places, for example. Dr. Lee Mun Wei, a senior manager at the Food Innovation and Resource Centre (FIRC) in Singapore aims to predict and prevent illness in a given population by tracking their biometric data using Apple watch-like wearables, then 3D printing nutrient-specific foods that could mitigate imbalances. 

Though these technologies exist, they are still in their infancy. Singapore leads much of the research and development out of necessity. With limited land and water resources, the county is forced to import 90 percent of their food and 40 percent of their water from outside the country. As a result, they have no option but to grow vertically and desalinate water from the ocean. 

Elsewhere, the industry has been slow to catch on, largely due to exorbitant startup costs, low returns, and lack of urgent need. According to a 2017 State of Farming report by L.E.K., only 27 percent of indoor, vertical farms are profitable compared with 50 percent of container farms and 75 percent of greenhouses. But one thing has spurred the industry on in recent years: cannabis. 

Legalized in 39 states, demand for cannabis has created a $13.6 billion industry and enough capital to fund CEA-enabled grow operations. “When you have a crop that fetches up to $2,400 or $2,500 a pound, you need to be able to dial everything in and make it consistent and repeatable,” says Dashiel Kulander, co-founder and CEO at Boojum Group. “If the temperature swings five to 10 degrees on a cannabis plant, that will change the plant’s various cannabinoids. The goal is to create a medicine that is consistent batch after batch.” 

It’s only recently that there has been some financial incentive to use CEA technologies for food use―largely driven by Big Ag players hoping to hedge out the competition. Berry farming giant Driscoll’s, for one, led a $500 million round to fund Plenty, a 2.2-acre vertical farm in California they hope will help them fulfill a contract with Albertsons. The Ingka Group, for another, led a $100 million round to fund AeroFarms, a 2.4-acre vertical farm in New Jersey that will help them fulfill a contract with Singapore Airlines. 

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Grōv tent at the Bateman Mosida Farms. Photo from Grōv Technologies

Grōv Tech is building CEA prototypes in Utah

By investing in Grōv Tech, Nu Skin hopes to do something similar, getting ahead of the supply chain that fuels their skincare products before the competition can beat them to it, or before climate change makes traditional methods more difficult, all while shoring up technology that could provide a farming model that is more sustainable―if only it were more economical.  

“The purpose was always, can we build a better product for Nu Skin?” Wood says. “We think there’s a huge story around the ingredient sustainability, and there were a lot of ingredients we felt we could grow, but the challenge was: could we do it in an economical way?”

Grōv Tech started out with a prototype: a tower that pairs hydroponic growing technology with grow lights. But like all CEA startups, a lot of the growing process was manual and the technology was prohibitively expensive. To make something that was scalable and profitable the whole thing needed to be automated and it needed to be cheap. 

With this goal in mind, Wood decided they would start by growing animal feed for Bateman’s Dairy farm. Having grown up on a dairy farm himself, Wood figured this would allow the company to scale the product while refining and automating the technology to the point that it could be replicated. And all of this would have a fortuitous effect on Nu Skin’s bottom line. 

“One of our bestselling products is a weight-loss protein powder which uses whey protein,” Wood says. “So again, a very nice connection there is if the animal is eating a more sustainable product and producing better milk with better protein and it’s being done in a sustainable way―certainly that can be a benefit to Nu Skin down the road.”

One year into feeding the 20,000 animals at Bateman, the company has learned a lot. For instance: cows need a lot of magnesium, but they don’t like eating it. Now, Grōv Tech puts magnesium in the water so it’s directly absorbed into the plant and then becomes bioavailable to the cow upon eating it. And because the growing process only takes seven days, data scientists can analyze the results in real-time and adjust the components to optimize production for the next batch of feed. 

According to Grōv Tech president Steven Lindsley, it’s not far off that we’ll be looking at milk production (butter, fats, and proteins) and optimizing a herd’s diet for taste, quality, and nutritional value―not to mention the wellbeing of the animal. We’ll be able to look at how many trips from the veterinarian an animal gets when they’re fed certain nutrients in their diet, and whether they can have more calves and produce the same amount of dairy on less, better quality feed. (So far, the answer to this last question is yes. When animals are fed better quality food they need less of it―just like humans.) 

And if we hook all of the cows up to robotic milking equipment and connect everything to artificial intelligence, machine learning, and the Internet of Things―Lindsley’s far-flung goal―then we might be able to collect enough data to not only feed cows to their optimum health and performance ability, but humans too. And that could have ramifications not only for feeding the world, but nourishing it― just like Dr. Wei hopes to do in Singapore.  

“Last year was about starting to feed animals and get data and prove out the hypothesis we have while continuing to perfect the technology and get confidence there,” Wood says. “And now we’re really to a point where we’ve got data that proves that it works and that financially it’ll be a good thing for a farmer. So now we can really take that proposition to farmers and start to scale.”

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Olympus Tower Farm at Bateman Farms in Mosida, UT. Photo from Grōv Technologies

CEA technology could feed the world

Right now, Grōv Tech is focused on refining its technology right here in our own backyard. But once they do that, the plan is to expand internationally. 

“Saudi Arabia has actually passed a law where you cannot use water to grow fodder or feed for animals, so all of that now has to be imported. China imports one-third of their alfalfa feed for their dairy animals because they don’t have the capability of growing it,” Wood says. “So there are countries that will probably benefit more than the US would. But we’ve got to refine the technology and get that built to where it’s ready to scale before we start spreading ourselves all around the globe.”

CEA technology is just getting started. Like the Tesla Cybertruck, we have a working concept that promises a more-than-Jetson’s-level future many of us can see the benefits of and actively want―it’s just not quite available to the masses yet. But with more than a billion dollars invested in the technology in just the past few years alone―we’re getting there. And the “there” we are heading toward is rosy indeed. 

“To put it in perspective, one tower that is about 875 square feet on the ground will replace 35 to 50 acres of land,” says Lindsley. “And that will feed the animals on roughly five percent of the amount of water. The UN says that that the world will add about 2.5 billion people in the next 30 years. And we have to find a way to feed them on arguably less arable land and water. The good news is the technology is coming along to help solve that equation.”

If COVID-19 taught us anything, it’s that our food supply chain is fragile. But that’s only because our supply chain was built to grow food in California, refrigerate it so it stays fresh, then transport it 1,500 miles so we can eat a salad in the winter in Chicago. In the future, that might not be a thing. “We’re having a dry year now,” Lindsley tells me in February. “But a year ago we were in a blizzard, and even in the middle of a blizzard in February in Utah, we’re pumping out fresh, beautiful, safe green grass for animals. It’s a paradigm shift.”

“Four years ago it was a good idea,” Wood tells me of his company’s investment in CEA technology, “But four years from now it’s going to be required.”

Elle Griffin

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Elle is the editor-in-chief of Utah Business and a freelance writer for Forbes, The Muse, and The Startup. She is also a literary novelist and the author of a weekly newsletter called The Novelleist. Learn more at ellegriffin.com.

USA: TEXAS - Iron Ox Breaks Ground On New Robotic Growing Facility In Lockhart

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By FOX 7 Austin Digital Team

April 22, 2021

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California-based company Iron Ox held a groundbreaking ceremony for its new Lockhart facility in partnership with the Economic Development Corporation of Lockhart. (City of Lockhart)

LOCKHART, Texas - A new robotic growing facility is expected to bring over 100 jobs to the city of Lockhart.

Iron Ox, a California-based company that specialized in robotics and AI-enabled farming with a mission to solve food insecurity, has begun construction on a 535,000 square-foot indoor hydroponic farm in the city.

Once completed, the farm, which sits on 25 acres of agricultural land, will significantly increase Iron Ox’s growing capacity for fresh, clean, and healthy herbs, leafy greens, berries, and vine crops, says the company. The state-of-the-art indoor facility will be fully dedicated to growing techniques harnessing the power of robotics and intelligence, enabling Iron Ox to grow sustainable, local produce to serve the Texas community.

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Iron Ox, a California-based company that specialized in robotics and AI-enabled farming with a mission to solve food insecurity, has begun construction on a 535,000-square-foot indoor hydroponic farm in the city. (City of Lockhart)

The company says that Lockhart is an ideal location for greenhouse agriculture given its ample sunlight, central location near many cities, and it’s proximity to several great universities.

The indoor farm is expected to cost over $10 million to develop, says Iron Ox, with 275,000 square feet of the project anticipated to be completed by the end of this year and 260,000 square feet of the project anticipated to complete by the beginning of 2022. In total, the project will create over 100 jobs.

"The addition of Iron Ox to the Lockhart business community represents synergy between our city’s storied history in agriculture and our growing technology sector," said Lockhart Mayor Lew White in a release. "The food and beverage processing industry is one of four business sectors Lockhart has targeted in its 5-year economic growth plan. Our city’s unique advantages align perfectly with the needs of companies like Iron Ox."

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Lockhart Mayor Lew White (left) and Iron Ox co-founder and CEO Brandon Alexander stand next to a concept drawing of the new Iron Ox facility being built in Lockhart. (City of Lockhart)

Iron Ox expects to complete their first harvest and to begin delivering sustainable, local produce to select chefs and retailers throughout Texas by the end of this year. It is anticipated that Lockhart’s hydroponic facility will grow thousands of pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables. Each crop type is cared for by Iron Ox’s expert growers and empowered by a robotic growing process ensuring year-round consistency, quality, and flavor says the company.

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"We have made it our mission to address food security by developing autonomous greenhouses that grow a variety of local and consistently delicious food for everyone", said Iron Ox CEO and co-founder Brandon Alexander. "We’re excited to begin development of our newest indoor farm here in Lockhart—our first out-of-state facility. We look forward to further developing ties to the local community and to expanding our partnerships and distribution channels throughout the state of Texas."

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Iron Ox co-founder and CEO Brandon Alexander addresses people at the groundbreaking ceremony of the new Iron Ox facility in Lockhart. (City of Lockhart)

Focused on sustainable, scalable food production for a changing climate and an ever-growing population, the Iron Ox process eases the growing pressure of food waste and labor scarcity by providing a stable supply of fresh, nutritious food for local communities, says the company.

Iron Ox says it designed its growing system around the sun, an approach that uses less energy than other modern forms of farming. Their hydroponic growing system uses 90% less water over traditional farming while growing 30 times the amount of crops per acre of land, allowing Iron Ox to deliver on its mission to increase access to premium produce for everyone.

Iron Ox currently operates two hydroponic farms located in Gilroy and San Carlos, California.

VIDEO: Indoor Farming Powered By Robotics And Technology - Plenty

Author: abc10.com

April 6, 2021

AppHarvest Acquires Agricultural Robotics And Artificial Intelligence Company Root AI To Increase Efficiency

Acquisition of Root AI and its signature robot, Virgo, bolsters the company’s intelligent tools to produce foods sustainably. Root AI CEO Joins AppHarvest as Chief Technology Officer

MOREHEAD, Ky., April 08, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- AppHarvest, Inc. (NASDAQ: APPH, APPHW), a leading AgTech company and Certified B Corp focused on farming more sustainably using 90 percent less water than open-field agriculture and only recycled rainwater, announced today that it has acquired Root AI, an artificial intelligence farming startup that creates intelligent robots to help manage high-tech indoor farms. The acquisition of Root AI and its robotic universal harvester, Virgo, is expected to provide AppHarvest with a baseline of harvesting support working alongside crop care specialists focused on more complex tasks. AppHarvest expects the game-changing advantage of the technology to be in the data the robots can collect as they harvest, which can help evaluate crop health, precisely predict yield and optimize overall operations of the controlled environment agriculture (CEA) facility. 

“Farming as we’ve known it is broken because of the increasing number of variables such as extreme weather, droughts, fire, and contamination by animals that make our food system unreliable. Indoor farming solves for many of those challenges, and the data gathered can exponentially deliver more insights that help us predict and control crop quality and yield,” said AppHarvest Founder & CEO Jonathan Webb. “One of the key challenges in agriculture is accurately predicting yield. Many downstream decisions from work scheduling to transportation to retail planning are based on that. Any deviation between projection and actual yield can result in fire drills for numerous functions to adjust for the change, and AI can help solve for that.”  

Root AI co-founder and CEO Josh Lessing will take on the role of Chief Technology Officer for AppHarvest where he will take the lead in continuing to develop the robots and their AI capabilities for the network of indoor farms that AppHarvest is building. Lessing, along with co-founder Ryan Knopf who will join AppHarvest as vice president of technology, helped establish Root AI as an early leader in employing artificial intelligence in CEA. Virgo is the world’s first universal harvester, which can be configured to identify and harvest multiple crops of varying sizes including tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers and more delicate fruits such as strawberries among others.

Though Virgo can work indoors or out, the robot’s focus has been on controlled environment agriculture. Over the past three years, it has collected the world’s largest data set of tomato images to enable it to identify more than 50 varieties in multiple growing environments and at varying stages of maturity to learn how and when to harvest. 

Virgo uses a set of cameras combined with an infrared laser to generate a 3D color scan of an area to determine the work it can perform. Once it maps the tomatoes, it assesses their orientation and determines if they are ripe enough to pick. The robot can be programmed to make other quality assessments as well. The scan enables the robot to find the least obstructive and fastest route to pick the crop ahead of the arrival of the robotic arm and gripper. The robot can identify hundreds of tomatoes in a fraction of a second without having to connect to the cloud. Virgo keeps score on its success rate like a video game. A built-in feedback mechanism constantly evaluates its efficiency so it learns how to harvest any given configuration of fruit most effectively.

“A piece of food—whether that’s a tomato or a berry or a cucumber—is an outcome from many variables that are part of the growing process. Enhanced data collection for each plant through the robot can lead to insights that teach us precisely how to design better, more resilient food systems that are reliable and that produce more food with fewer resources,“ said Lessing. “Joining forces with AppHarvest is a natural fit: we want to ensure a stable, safe supply of the nutritious and healthy food that people should be eating -- grown sustainably -- and doing that at the scale of AppHarvest gives us the opportunity to make the greatest difference.” 

Gathering more data through AI enables growers to use real-time information to improve a number of sustainability efforts such as detecting and eliminating pests naturally, helping indoor farms successfully grow chemical pesticide-free fruits and vegetables.

AppHarvest is investing approximately $60 million, consisting of approximately $10 million in cash and the balance in AppHarvest common shares, to acquire Root AI. The Company will issue approximately 2,328,000 shares for the transaction.

Founded in 2018, Root AI is based in Somerville, Mass., and has 19 full-time employees, all of whom are expected to join AppHarvest’s technology group to help advance the mission of building a resilient and sustainable food supply.

About AppHarvest

AppHarvest is an applied technology company building some of the world’s largest high-tech indoor farms in Appalachia that grow non-GMO, chemical pesticide-free produce using 90 percent less water than open-field agriculture and only recycled rainwater while producing yields up to 30 times that of traditional agriculture on the same amount of land with zero agricultural runoff. The Company combines conventional agricultural techniques with cutting-edge technology and is addressing key issues including improving access for all to nutritious food, farming more sustainably, building a domestic food supply, and increasing investment in Appalachia. The Company’s 60-acre Morehead, Ky. facility is among the largest indoor farms in the U.S.

For more information, visit https://www.appharvest.com/.

UNFI Picks Up Living Greens Farm Products in Midwest Expansion

I|mage from: Living Green Farms

Living Greens Farm (LGF), the largest vertical, indoor aeroponic farm in the US that provides year-round fresh salads, salad kits, microgreens and herbs, announced the addition of significant new retail distribution of its products in the upper Midwest to independent, specialty, and co-op retailers.

Starting February 2021, LGF’s full line of products featuring ready-to-eat bagged salad products (Caesar Salad Kit, Southwest Salad Kit, Harvest Salad Kit, Chopped Romaine, and Chopped Butter Lettuce) will be carried by UNFI Produce Prescott (formerly Alberts Fresh Produce). UNFI Produce Prescott is a division of UNFI, which distributes food products to thousands of stores nationwide. Their focus is on independent, specialty and co-op retailers.

UNFI has eight warehouses nationwide. LGF’s products will be carried by their upper Midwest location, located just across the river from the Twin Cities in Prescott, WI. This distribution center services hundreds of retailers throughout Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, North Dakota, South Dakota, Missouri, Iowa and Nebraska. UNFI is the first national Certified Organic distributor, something they take a lot of pride in. Their produce and floral businesses are rooted in local farms and seasonal import growers.

LGF’s proprietary vertical indoor farming method yields the highest quality and freshest produce available. This is because there are no pesticides or chemicals used in the growing process. And because LGF’s growing, cleaning and bagging process significantly reduces handling and time to the retail shelf, consumers enjoy the freshest product on the market. These benefits continue to attract new users and new retail distribution as UNFI Produce Prescott is the second UNFI location to carry LGF. In December, UNFI’s Hopkins, MN location began offering LGF products.

For more information on why Living Greens Farm products are the cleanest, freshest and healthiest farm salads and greens available, go to www.livinggreensfarm.com.

Advice For New Vertical Farmers: Grower Spotlight on Andrew Worrall

Last week we spoke about running a farm at LettUs Grow. What excites you about vertical farming? 

It’s the future of the industry. Also, the amount of salad that these farms can produce for their local community. We want to be able to eat salad all year round and we import to make that happen. However, just a small farm can easily provide for its local community, very efficiently and all year round. The sustainability element is also exciting: with our salad there’s no food miles, it’s very minimalistic. You could use an electric van or bike to distribute this crop if you wanted to. It’s a step forward in terms of what we need to do to take care of our planet. 

What do you think are the biggest downsides to vertical farming?

It’s still a new technology and it can be expensive. The biggest roadblock facing the industry is that we need more people and companies to collaborate together to make sure we can build these farms at a sensible rate, so we can provide farms to anyone. We want to be able to provide farms to people, communities and countries that don’t have a lot of money, so that they can provide affordable fresh produce to local people. 

How has vertical farming impacted your life?

Massively!  I wanted to find my passion, a job that I loved - that was very important to me. It’s satisfying to be in a position now where I’m very happy to be doing what I do and I look forward to going into work. I was happy to make the move from London to Bristol. I would have moved even further if it meant being able to continue working within this industry.

Image from: LettUs Grow

How do you see vertical farming playing a part in the future? 

When indoor farming first came about, it had a reputation of being competition for outdoor farming, which just isn’t the case. There’s so much we can’t grow that outdoor farming can provide, such as cereal crops. I’m glad we’re at a stage where indoor and outdoor farms can start to work together to optimise both methods. With these new relationships, there should be a good increase in the amount of indoor farms you’ll be seeing. What LettUs Grow offers with DROP & GROW™ is an exciting project because that’s a 40ft shipping container which can be placed pretty much anywhere. It’s not that big - it could go in a car park or behind a restaurant, but actually provide quite a lot of salad to that area. 

How much of our food should be grown this way? 

Good question. If you had asked me a while back I would have just said salad, but now I’ve changed my mind. Indoor farming can have a massive impact on propagation, especially aeroponics, because of how we aerate and nourish our roots. We could start lettuce for greenhouse projects and we can also propagate tomatoes, strawberries and tree whips. Propagating trees in this way could potentially be hugely beneficial and it’s something we want to do more of. 

We can also quickly grow large amounts of microgreens, baby leafs, herbs and we can grow fruiting crops like strawberries. We are slowly chipping away and it’s really exciting. I’m waiting to see if I can ever say I’ve grown or propagated every crop that can be grown in these farms! 

What do you think are the biggest benefits of vertical farming? 

How fast these crops can grow! The turnover can be as short as 5 days from seed, depending on the crop. Also how clean it can be - I’m very dedicated to making sure these farms are built to ensure they are easy to be maintained and clean. The most exciting part is the crop growth rate though - it’s incredible how fast our crop grows from seed to plate. In a very well maintained growing calendar, which Ostara® is great for supporting, you can optimise your beds so that the day you harvest can also be the day you germinate onto that same bed. Your farms can be forever providing salad at very fast rates. 

Image from: LettUs Grow

What was the biggest change you encountered during your years indoor farming?

Moving from being a production grower to an R&D grower. It has been a great change! As a production grower I knew what I needed to know about growing the plant safely and getting it onto a plate so it was good for the consumer. Now I’m fully optimising, learning and understanding the plants completely, so that I can help the grower that I used to be. We spend a lot of time on crop recipes to make sure that whoever we sell our farms to can start up very quickly and they won’t have to spend months developing their crops. If they have the customers and clients behind them, they can buy DROP & GROW and start producing salad as soon as it's been commissioned. 

What was the biggest change you encountered in the industry?

More and more people are speaking about what’s going on in the industry and getting involved. I get so many messages on LinkedIn with people who want to get into this career. It’s exciting to see that indoor growing is a career people can access now. When I was developing my skills I didn’t know I would end up in indoor farming. There are more opportunities than ever before. For example, our Crop Technician is doing a placement here for 2 years. The aim is that they can gain the skill sets and knowledge they need to then go off and do the same practice in any farm they want. 

What advice do you have for people who are looking to start a career in growing? 

Reach out to companies who are already out there. You could start off part-time or as an assistant. If you are patient and dedicated then it’s a journey I promise you won’t regret. It takes a lot of work, but the outcome is amazing - you’ll be learning so much about this new technology. You’ll also build great relationships: there are so many amazing people in this industry who are so interesting, with different backgrounds, who are willing to share their knowledge. You can always learn more and other people are a great source of that. 

What about for those looking to start a vertical farming business?

Do your homework.  There are people out there who you can reach out to and it’s very easy to get information. It’s very easy to get excited about the idea and jump straight into it, because it is exciting and can be very rewarding, but it’s really important to do it step by step. Know how to scale properly, learning the differences between a small and larger farm. Understand how many people you’ll need and the logistics. I’d also advise people to get some practical work experience before you buy. You want to start the company knowing the tricks of the trade. 

Image from: LettUs Grow

LettUs Grow Blog: www.lettusgrow.com/blog/advice-for-vertical-farmers

January Indoor Ag-Conversations Webinar | AI and Robotics For Indoor Farms

LET'S KEEP THE CONVERSATION GOING!

THURSDAY, JANUARY 21, 2020

2-3 PM EDT

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You won't want to miss our first Indoor Ag-Conversations webinar

session for 2021 as our expert panel takes a deep dive into

 AI & Robotics  

Moderator:   

Dr. Murat Kacira,  Director of the Controlled Environment Agriculture Center and Professor of Biosystems Engineering Department, University of Arizona

Panelists:

 Adam Greenberg, CEO, iUNU 

Samuel Bertram, CEO & Co-Founder, OnePointOne

Nick Genty, CEO, AgEye Technologies

LEARN MORE & SAVE YOUR FREE SPOT!

VIDEO: How 2 Hong Kong Pioneers’ Hi-Tech Robotic Arms Can Transform Traditional Industries And Research

Technology created at Jonathan Cheung’s Inovo Robotics performs repetitive tasks that can cultivate sustainable crops and process foods in automated kitchens

Eric Wong has transformed lab experiments with Nikyang’s automated tools that allow researchers to carry out a more reliable and systematic analysis

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Morning Studio editors

7 January 2021

While robotic technology has been widely used by big manufacturing companies to increase productivity, the high cost of getting started means many smaller businesses have yet to take advantage of its huge potential.

However, Inovo Robotics, a Hong Kong-based technology start-up, is working to solve this problem.

Since it was founded in 2016, the robotics company has been developing solutions for small- and medium-sized enterprises to help them adapt to automation in their everyday business practices.

Jonathan Cheung, the co-founder of the start-up, says his goal is to “democratize robots” and develop tools for all businesses to help them improve efficiency and remain competitive.

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“We found that there is such a big disconnect to the market for small businesses to be able to benefit from affordable and flexible robots,” he says.

“There are a lot of businesses that are struggling to get staff to do monotonous tasks, so what we’re developing is really a tool that enables them to take away repetitive work.”

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Jonathan Cheung, the co-founder of Inovo Robotics, says high entry costs mean that many small businesses have yet to take full advantage of automation’s full potential.

Disrupting traditional industries

One of the applications of the robotic arms has seen them used around the clock to carry out repetitive tasks that help grow high-quality, pollution-free vegetables at a futuristic farm in Hong Kong’s Tai Po district.

The farm, operated by indoor farming company Farm66 since 2018, is located inside a 20,000-square-foot (1,860-square-metre) factory building.

The use of the robotic arms to automatically sow seeds and harvest plants helps the farm to produce up to 200 tonnes of organic fresh produce, including cherry tomatoes, cabbage and basil, which is sold online and delivered to the city’s supermarkets and restaurants.

“Robots really improve the efficiency and speed of the products that are being made,” Cheung says. “In this competitive world, there is always a desire to drive costs down.”

In the case of vertical farming, the technology means minimal space and manpower are needed for the farming process, offering a glimpse of how technology will be able to transform farming in future.

Besides the vertical farm, the technology has also been used in an automated kitchen, where it helps with food processing to ensure cooking consistency. Inovo Robotics is also teaming up with a programming company to develop a system for high-resolution 3D scanning.

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Inovo Robotics’ technology is being used to cultivate fresh organic produce at Farm66’s futuristic indoor farm inside an industrial factory building in Hong Kong. Photo: Farm66

Popularising robots for everyday use

Before setting up his own venture, Cheung spent more than a decade working as an engineer, when he witnessed first-hand how robots can help businesses scale their operations.

In 2016, Cheung and a colleague co-founded Inovo Robotics to popularise the everyday use of robot technology by businesses.

Its launch product, Modular Arm, with an adjustable system of six fully rotatable joints, gives the robot the flexibility to reach different positions. The robot’s modularity also gives customers an easy mechanism to choose longer or shorter arms, depending on their configurations.

Cheung says while large manufacturing companies often require tools that can automate a repetitive task, smaller businesses look for collaborative robots that can work alongside staff to complete different jobs at the same time.

“Smaller businesses tend to have smaller batch sizes and tighter spaces,” he says. “That is where a collaborative robot really comes into its own.”

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Jonathan Cheung says Inovo Robotics’ modular robot technology offers small businesses a variety of options thanks to its adjustable flexible joints and the choice of using shorter or longer arms.

Inovo Robotics currently has two offices at Hong Kong Science Park, a government-run start-up incubator, and London, in the United Kingdom, as it seeks to tap into both the Asia-Pacific and European markets.

Cheung says Hong Kong has proved an ideal location to scale up his business because of its proximity to hi-tech research and an abundance of talent.

“[We can] be close to our supply chain, which allows us to manage it closely and deliver the best product to our customers,” he says.

“At any point in Hong Kong, you are probably within 25km to five or 10 great universities,” he adds. “There is a wealth of talent to be able to tap into – there are only a few countries with that level of accessibility.”

Revolutionizing academic research

Another Hong Kong start-up, Nikyang, has also developed fully automated laboratory equipment to help academic researchers increase the reliability of data collected in experiments.

Today, its automation technology has been applied in many settings, such as research institutes and pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies.

The venture was founded by Hongkonger Eric Wong in 1999 with the initial goal of helping researchers in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) to conduct analysis in a more systematic way.

“The basic dream of Nikyang was originally to pursue TCM research to gain a better understanding,” says Wong, who graduated with a master’s degree in biochemistry in Canada.

“I thought we needed a more standardized way of doing analysis in TCM to collect valid and precise information.”

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Eric Wong, the founder of automation company Nikyang, says the use of robotic technology allows researchers to conduct more systematic analysis.

When he started his business journey by reaching out to laboratories in Hong Kong and mainland China, he realized that researchers wanted to use machines to help them follow the correct procedure as closely as possible while carrying out repetitive work.

However, many automated instruments available then lacked the ability to carry out different steps in lab research, he says, rendering them error-prone when applied in studies.

To solve the problem, Wong collaborated with Chemspeed, a Switzerland-based provider of lab equipment, in developing specific instruments for TCM research.

His team has integrated Chemspeed’s tools with robotic arms and wearables to increase collaboration between researchers and machines in conducting the analysis.

However, he realized the company would not be sustainable if it focused solely on serving the TCM industry, so he later diversified the business and began developing solutions for different settings.

In 2008, Nikyang began receiving orders from petrochemical companies in China, which gave Wong a lifeline to sustain his business and pursue his dream in TCM research.

The venture now places an emphasis on boosting effectiveness by providing an immerse lab experience.

Its SmartLab product, which is still under development, is set to integrate sensor technology, smart wearables, and cloud data management to help researchers work more efficiently with machines.

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Nikyang’s SmartLab, which is still under development, will integrate sensor technology, smart wearables, and cloud data management so researchers can work more efficiently with machines. Photo: Nikyang

Nikyang has its headquarters at Hong Kong Science Park, where it carries out most of its research and development work. To tap into the China market, it has also opened branches in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou to sell its products.

Wong says Hong Kong has served as an ideal location to grow his company because of its connectivity with China and different parts of the world.

“Hong Kong is definitely unique in terms of being a super-connector between the East and the West,” he says.

The city’s world-class financial market and sound legal system have also helped start-ups in raising capital and developing ideas as they embark on their journey.

Pioneering spirit

Both Wong and Cheung believe it is important for aspiring innovators to be passionate about their business vision to help them overcome challenges when developing and selling the products.

Wong, who spent a decade before he found a way to make his business sustainable, says it was vital to remain dedicated because many innovators experience failures before they can get their businesses on track.

“You need to have passion and a big heart to accept failure, and [an] even bigger heart to think and take risks,” he says.

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Eric Wong, who spent a decade before finding a way to make Nikyang sustainable, says aspiring innovators should be passionate about their business vision – and not focus only on profits.

Wong also advises young entrepreneurs not to look only at making profits if they want to make a difference in the world.

“Money is only a by-product,” he says, adding that many successful pioneers often have to make substantial investments before they are able to disrupt the industry.

Cheung agrees that innovators must feel empowered to turn ideas into reality.

“My advice is to really focus on the business model,” he says. “It’s a very, very difficult journey to go on, and it’s very, very rewarding as well. And it’s very important to make sure you stay true to what you believe in.

“Having an idea that you believe in wholeheartedly, that you are willing to give your time and commitment to, is a good validation that you are on the right track.”

Morning Studio is the commercial content team of the South China Morning Post (SCMP). It aims to engage readers through storytelling while enabling the brand behind the content to achieve its marketing objectives. The Morning Studio team consists of specialists in various areas such as journalism, multimedia graphics, video production, digital technology, and marketing.

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Iron Ox Announces Next Robotic Farm In Lockhart, TX

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November 6, 2020

LOCKHART, TX, — Iron Ox, a leader in robotics and AI-enabled farming with a mission to solve food insecurity, and the City of Lockhart, Texas today announced that Iron Ox will expand their operations to the city with plans to break ground on a new facility this December, bringing new tax revenue and jobs to Lockhart.

Since 2015, Iron Ox has developed hybrid robotic greenhouses that support a range of produce offerings. To bring those produce offerings to new communities, the company identified Texas as the next state in their national expansion plan with its favorable business environment and rich history of agriculture.

“We’re proud to make Lockhart our next farm outside of California,” said Brandon Alexander, Iron Ox CEO & Co-founder. “Lockhart’s city government, as well as their planning and development staff, worked diligently with us throughout this process and made us feel right at home. In addition, the city's central location within the Texas triangle and short drive from Austin, allows for strong distribution lanes of same-day grown and harvested products throughout the entire state of Texas, making the city the ideal choice for our robotic greenhouse growing platform”.

Iron Ox has purchased nearly 25 acres of land and plans to build a new, state-of-the-art facility on the property. This new facility will house the company’s natural light greenhouses, processing operations and AI-enabled robots to bring fresh, clean and healthy food to new customers and communities throughout Texas.

“The addition of Iron Ox to the Lockhart business community represents synergy between our city’s storied history in agriculture and our growing technology sector,” said Lockhart Mayor Lew White. “The food and beverage processing industry is one of four business sectors Lockhart has targeted in its 5-year economic growth plan because our city’s unique advantages align perfectly with the needs of companies like Iron Ox.”

Mike Kamerlander, Director, Economic Development, represented the Lockhart Economic Development Corporation (CEcD) on this project.

“As Lockhart continues to grow, Iron Ox and companies like it are essential to our economic vitality and future. We thank them for their investment and commitment to Lockhart.”

About Iron Ox

Iron Ox launched the world’s first autonomous farm in October 2018, leveraging advancements in plant science, machine learning, and robotics. The Iron Ox team develops AI-enabled, autonomous technology that enables fresher, more consistent produce to be grown and distributed globally. The company’s goal is to service thousands of communities with the freshest and healthiest products, while establishing global reach and impact on food security.

For more information, visit www.ironox.com.

About Lockhart Economic Development Corporation

The Lockhart Economic Development Corporation, a department within the City of Lockhart, is designed to provide a range of business and economic development assistance. To learn more about opportunities in Lockhart, visit www.lockhartedc.com.

Contact Info:

Taylor Aldredge

press@ironox.com

570-534-4754

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VIDEO: AI-Controlled Vertical Farms Promise Revolution In Food Production

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DECEMBER 30, 2020

by Peter Grad, Tech Xplore

When you think about it, early civilizations had a rough time when it came to dinnertime. With no supermarkets, McDonald's, or Cheesecake Factories, you pretty much had to find and prepare your own meal every day. And since Uber would not be invented for another 14,000 years, primitive peoples around 12,000 BC had to walk, sometimes for miles, and learn to hunt, fish, gather and cook for their daily meals. In the rain. Even on Sundays.

Farming evolved quite a bit since then. But with a world population hurtling towards 8 billion, we face a problem. As the 18th-century economist Thomas Malthus observed, the human population increases geometrically, while food production increases only arithmetically. That means the more civilization grows and thrives, the more likely it will be unable to keep up with demands for food.

While advances in food technology have helped forestall Malthus' dire predictions, there remains a great concern for the future of food production as the Earth's population soars on a planet with shrinking farming real estate. National Geographic recently predicted that by 2050, there will be more than two billion additional mouths to feed while the Earth's irrigable land remains essentially the same.

A San Francisco agricultural-technical startup thinks it might just have an answer. Nate Storey, who co-founded the appropriately named Plenty, wants to reinvent farming.

To do so, he has constructed climate-controlled vertical farms that are so promising, they have drawn $400 million in funding from former Google Chairman Eric Schmidt, Amazon's Jeff Bezos, and SoftBank.

These upright farms take up only 2 acres yet produce 720 acres worth of fruit and vegetables. Lighting, temperature and watering are controlled by AI-controlled robots. Sunlight is emulated by LED panels, so food is grown in optimal conditions 24/7. And water is recycled and evaporated water recaptured so there is virtually no waste.

The operation is so efficient it uses 99 percent less land and 95 percent less water than normal farming operations.

"Imagine a 1,500-acre farm," Storey says. "Now, imagine that fitting inside your favorite grocery store, growing up to 350 times more. That's efficient."

It is so efficient that these rows of hanging plants produce 400 times more food per acre than a traditional farm.

AI monitors growth patterns and constantly adjusts environmental factors such as temperature, water, and light patterns to ensure ever-more efficient and economical output.

In an era that has seen food production lines disrupted by a pandemic, wildfires, and hurricanes, Plenty's approach will play a key role in ensuring future stability in the food chain.

Plenty's website explains vertical farming "free agriculture from the constraints of weather, seasons, time, distance, pests, natural disasters, and climate."

Also noteworthy is that the crops are grown "GMO-free" and use no pesticides or herbicides, according to Plenty.

Plenty will soon supply more than 400 stores in California with its produce. The company says its packaging is specially designed to keep produce fresh longer and is 100 percent recyclable.

In October, Driscoll's, a leading producer of fresh berries, reached an agreement with Plenty to produce strawberries year-round in its Laramie, Wyoming-based farming operation, currently the largest privately-owned vertical farming and research facility in the world.

The Plenty website lists several products currently offered in stores, including lettuce, arugula, bok choy, mizuna and kale.

If the first civilizations to invent farming back around 12,000 BC only had the convenience of vertical farming, maybe they could have saved 8,000 or so years by spending more time working on inventing the wheel. And ear pods.

Explore further

The yield potential of wheat grown in controlled-environment vertical farms

Lead photo: Credit: Plenty

100% Robotization Allows Constant Quality Produce

"One of the biggest bottlenecks for most vertical farms is labor-intensity and associated costs. Our first focus was to reduce manual handling," says Ard van de Kreeke, Growx's CEO and founder.

Growx has recently been featured in the 75th edition of RuMoer Magazine by BOUT, a master student association program in Building Technology at TU Delft, the Netherlands. The 75th issue is dedicated to urban farming as a solution for reconnecting the urban population to their food sources. 

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Ard continues, "Not only to reduce cost but also to ensure a constant quality of produce. The implementation of 100% robotization was successfully introduced in 2020. This not only makes a huge difference in labor costs and produce quality but also keeps the cell extremely clean. Human interfaces are only needed for malfunctions and checks. Another additional advantage is that there is no need to keep aisles and room for personnel to move around."  

Each plant (gutters) continuously records broad water and nutrients, exposure, and air quality. But also a photographic representation in visible and infra-red light. This data stream is centrally stored and analyzed with the aim of developing optimal cultivation profiles. 

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Growx's robots pick up the entire process from start to finish, in other words, from seeds to harvest. "As soon as the plant moves on to the next phase of the growing cycle, the robot can respond automatically. Think of different light- or water composition," says Ard.

The company created a closed-loop system, where 100% of their waste is recycled to produce energy, CO2, water, and nutrients. They use an anaerobic digester for all the waste, which results in biogas that can be used for heat pumps and CO2 for the plants to use. 

The complete article can be found here. 

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For more information:
Growx
info@growx.co 
www.growx.co 

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Publication date:  Tuesday December 22 2020 Author: Rebekka Boekhout

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Utah Farm Using Robotic Vertical Farming To Feed Their Animals For Less

The Future of Farming Is Here In Utah, All Thanks To Something Called

Robotic Vertical Farming

By: Jordan Hogan

Posted at 8:19 AM, Nov 29, 2020

and last updated 7:08 AM, Nov 30, 2020

MOSIDA, Utah — A Utah tech company, Grōv Technologies, is working with a local farm, Bateman and Mosida Farms, to produce food for their cows more efficiently.

It's being done in towers that handle the whole growing process from start to finish.

The farm produces milk and meat from their cows, but raising them takes a lot of feed and a lot of time.

Now, technology is making part of the process easier.

Olympus Tower farms made by Grōv are a form of robotic vertical farming.

"The key is you can eliminate the weather challenges and it can give you a predictable optimized crop every time," said Steve Lindsley, the president of Grōv Technologies.

It starts with wheat seeds being loaded into trays. Then, they're wheeled up to the top of the tower to start a six-day journey back down to the bottom of the tower for harvest.

Along the way, they're watered with precision and given light from special LEDs that don't give off any heat.

The whole process is automated too, meaning it can run without the help of many traditional farmhands.

Grōv says each one of the towers produces 6,000 lbs of food each time it goes through its cycle. That saves money, time, water and energy. The benefits don’t stop there either — they are then passed on to the consumer.

"Each of these machines represents between 35 and 50 acres of land, so in this case here, it's the same as 50 acres of land but it's only covering 875 square feet of the ground and it uses 95% less water to grow the crops," said Lindsley.

Saving water and space is something that's becoming increasingly important as the demand for more homes increases and climate change increases the chances for extreme drought in the summer months.

"One of the biggest challenges farmers have around the world is how do they deal with the weather, the climate, and the uncertainties that come with that," Lindsley said.

The new technology couldn't have come at a better time for the farm either.

"In the first weeks and the first month of the COVID-19 Pandemic things started to go a little bit crazy," said Brad Bateman, a farming operations partner at Bateman Mosida Farms.

He said the farm wasn't able to order in a lot of their feed at the beginning of the pandemic, threatening the cows' food supply.

Now they can rely on their own production of feed, and this model of farming could be adopted beyond farms in the future.

"The vision that I see is there’s probably one of these in the back of every supermarket growing fresh food right in the store," said Bateman.

Grōv Technologies told FOX 13 they plan on rolling out this technology worldwide once they reach agreements with other farms.

Autonomous Delivery Startup Nuro Hits $5 Billion Valuation On Fresh Funding of $500 Million

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Kirsten Korosec@kirstenkorosec / November 9, 2020

Image Credits: Nuro

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Nuro,  the autonomous delivery startup founded by two former Google engineers, has raised $500 million, suggesting that investors still have an appetite for long-term pursuits such as robotics and automated vehicle technology. Nuro now has a post-money valuation of $5 billion.

The Series C round was led by funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price  Associates, Inc., with participation from new investors including Fidelity Management & Research Company and Baillie Gifford. The round also includes existing investors such as SoftBank Vision Fund 1 and Greylock.

Nuro was founded in June 2016 by former Google  engineers Dave Ferguson and Jiajun Zhu. While the startup was initially bootstrapped by Ferguson and Zhu, it has never struggled to attract investors. Nuro completed its first Series A funding round in China in 2016, a deal that gave NetEase founder Ding Lei (aka William Ding) a seat on Nuro’s board. A second, U.S.-based, round in June 2017 raised Nuro’s total Series A funding to $92 million. But it was the monster $940 million investment made by the SoftBank Vision Fund in February 2019 that catapulted Nuro ahead of numerous other startups attempting to commercialize autonomous vehicle technology. Nuro had a $2.7 billion valuation following the SoftBank investment, meaning its value doubled in about 18 months. That money has helped it grow to more than 650 employees.

Unlike many other startups in the AV industry, Nuro has focused its effort on designing a low-speed electric self-driving vehicle that transports packages, not people. Some of Nuro’s first tests and pilots were with Toyota Prius vehicles equipped with its self-driving system. Nuro partnered in 2018 with Kroger to pilot a delivery service in Arizona. The pilot, which initially used Toyota Prius vehicles, transitioned to its R1 delivery bot. Nuro has also partnered with companies like CVS, Domino’s, and Walmart.

The company has since developed a second-generation vehicle, known as the R2. This delivery bot, which is designed for local delivery service for restaurants, grocery stores, and other businesses, received an exemption from the federal government earlier this year that allows it to operate as a driverless vehicle.

“We are witnessing an unprecedented shift in consumer demand for safe and affordable local delivery services,” Zhu, CEO, and co-founder of Nuro said in a statement. “This funding, which brings us together with many of the world’s top investors, positions Nuro confidently toward a future where our world-class technology is adopted into people’s everyday lives.”

The company, which is testing and operating R2 on public roads in Arizona, California, and Texas, told TechCrunch that the new funding will allow it to “confidently grow for years to come, with multi-year runway to build in multiple cities and scale across multiple markets.” Nuro’s near-term focus is on scaling its service in Houston and implementing R2 into commercial service.

Bay Area Brothers Hope to Feed The World With Their Robotic Indoor Farming Technology

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June 28, 2020

By Linda Zavoral

Mercury News

(San Jose)SAN JOSE, Calif. – You’ll forgive the Bertram brothers if their Silicon Valley elevator pitch is as fast-paced as a doubles match. After all, they moved from Melbourne, Australia, to the United States to play collegiate tennis, then developed a love for engineering and robotics – and a lofty goal to meet the world’s nutritional needs.

Less than a decade after arriving in California, they co-founded OnePointOne, an agricultural technology company, and Willo, their direct-to-consumer health and lifestyle brand.

Their entrepreneurial “garage” is a two-story-tall indoor vertical farm in San Jose, California, where we met up with CEO Samuel (a Santa Clara University graduate) and Chief Technology Officer John (Westmont College, Technical University of Munich). After checking out the technology, gawking at the hundreds of red mizuna plants carefully nurtured by growers, engineers, and robots, and nibbling on just-harvested, state-of-the-art basil, it was time to ask some questions.

Q: How did you two hit upon this idea for a vertical farming start-up?

Sam: There are 1.1 billion people that began this millennium malnourished. Think about that number for a moment. Galvanized by its magnitude, John and I named our vertical farming company OnePointOne, or OPO, as a constant reminder of what we are aiming to solve. Compounding the problem: Poor nutrition kills more people in the USA than anything else, including cigarettes. Plants have always been and will continue to be, the solution to the problem of malnourishment and diet-related disease. Our technology – through production and plant research – intends to solve these problems.

Willo is the first revolutionary step in this direction. It is the direct-to-consumer brand of our company. By allowing you to configure and control what you grow in your Willo Farm Plot, we can work together to personalize your nutrition, and use plant-based food as the primary tool for preventative medicine that it has always been.

Q: How does Willo’s OnePointOne technology differ from other indoor farming methods?

John: Willo’s high-performance indoor farming technology is different from any other indoor or outdoor farm. We use LED lights to supplant the sun, we use a nutrient-rich mist to replace the soil, and a clean-room environment to keep the plants safe, comfortable, and away from the dangers of the outdoors. We are the only organization in the world to grow plants out of tall vertical towers using aeroponics (which is a form of hydroponics using a nutrient-rich mist). And we use fleet robotics to perform many of the functions inside of our farm – everything from plant seeding, plant movement, and plant inspection.

Q: An early client of yours is chef David Kinch’s new Mentone restaurant in Aptos.

He calls basil the “spirit animal” for that Cal-Mediterranean concept. So you’ve got a three-Michelin-starred chef who wants high-quality basil year-round. No pressure there! How did you develop a basil that meets his standards?

Sam: Chef Kinch offered us a challenge to replicate the quality of a specific basil variety grown in Pra, Italy. Through many months of varying the size, shape, taste, and texture of the basil, we arrived at precisely the product he was looking for. Now we are the sole supplier of Ligurian Genovese basil to his restaurant.

Funnily enough, now that we have the “recipe” to grow Mentone’s basil, the pressure is off. Since we control the plant’s experience so closely, the replicability and consistency of the product is guaranteed.

Q: Are there nutritional studies that have compared vegetables and herbs grown this way with those grown conventionally outdoors in soil?

Sam: Yes, and we are in the process of compiling an extensive study on Willo’s produce in comparison to outdoor-grown produce. What I can say is that organic farms use pesticides and often contain heavy metals. Willo’s produce never will.

To be clear, conventionally and “organically” grown produce is still far better for you than almost any other food, and the farmers/workers that grow it for you are modern-day superstars. The problem is one of sustainability. Massive consumption of water, large-scale contamination of water, soil degradation, and pesticide poisoning are all very serious problems that Willo’s farming technique eliminates.

Q: How do you mitigate the effects of the agricultural job losses this technology creates?

John: In every facility that Willo builds, there will be a host of new employment opportunities for a wide variety of skill sets – growers, engineers, scientists, and operators. These facilities are set to create jobs in each location we build, not eliminate them. Indoor farming is the last thing farmers and their laborers have to worry about. Without our technology, there is already a shortage of workers and an average age of 57. Willo ensures that in the midst of these statistics, consumers will continue to receive access to fresh produce.

Q: You’re now starting to grow produce for the public. How does this membership work and what will customers receive?

Sam: You get to subscribe directly to Willo’s Farm and claim a Farm Plot of your own. You’ll first receive a home-delivered Welcome Box filled with our first generation of crops; 5 oz. kale, 5 oz. mizuna, 5 oz. protein crunch, 5 oz. microgreens and a 5 oz. salad mix of the combination of products. Within seven days you’ll be given the opportunity to configure your farm with the crops you enjoy most or to continue with the Welcome Box farm configuration. Depending on your subscription, Willo delivers these five 5 oz. packages weekly or bi-monthly directly to your door.

Willo is currently developing an app to connect you directly to your Farm Plot. There, you’ll be able to watch your plants grow through time-lapse imagery, add new crops to your Farm Plot, trade Farm Plots with your neighbors, and donate Farm Plots to Willo’s charitable partners among many other things.

SWITZERLAND: Migros Basel And Growcer Launch Joint Vertical Farming Project

“Vertical Farming Meets The Demand

For More Sustainability And Regionality"

Together with the Migros Basel cooperative, Growcer is developing the first "Robotic Vertical Farm" in Switzerland, in order to grow regional foodstuffs there in the future, independent of weather conditions, pesticide-free and water-saving, and - thanks to the shortest transport routes - to deliver them quickly to the Migros branch. The start of production is imminent, and the first products are expected to be available exclusively in the MParc Dreispitz in the summer.

Switzerland's first "Robotic Vertical Farm" is currently being built in a hall located on the Wolf site in Basel. From sowing to irrigation and harvesting, machines take over the work fully automatically. The production chambers are sealed off from the environment, which means that production can take place all year round without soil, without any pesticides and with up to 90 percent less water.

In addition to all this, land consumption is, of course, minimal, as the cultivation beds can be stacked. This creates around 1,000m2 of cultivated area on a surface area of just 400m2. The farm can produce leafy vegetables and herbs all year round and, thanks to the immediate proximity of the sales point in the MParc Dreispitz, these can be delivered absolutely fresh within hours of being harvested.

Regionality and continuity
"Switzerland, like many countries, is dependent on imports. Via Growcer we bring regionality and continuity into it. In addition, pesticides are a problem for the population and nature, which we can solve by doing without them. With Migros Basel we have found a partner who supports our values and goals and is committed to the introduction of a new generation of sustainable products", says Marcel Florian, CEO of Growcer AG.

"Vertical farming is a trend that meets the demand for more sustainability and regionalism", says René Lori, Head of Supermarkets/Catering at Migros Basel. "The cooperation with Growcer gives us the opportunity to invest in an innovative and future-oriented project".

Year-round production
The production facility on the Wolf will be completed next spring, and the first products are expected to be available exclusively at Migros in the MParc Dreispitz in the summer. It is planned to produce further vegetables or fruit all year round at a later date and to supply other branches.

Migros Basel and Growcer are looking forward to the cooperation.

Source: Migros Basel

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Publication date: Fri 17 Jan 2020

Meet Angus: A Robotic Field Hand For The Autonomous Farming Revolution

The farm robot is part of Iron Ox’s aim to build hyper-efficient farms in the urban centers where most food is consumed.

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By Carl Engelking December 23, 2019

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Angus in action. (Credit: Iron Ox)

For centuries, farmers cajoled Earth’s bounty with oxen and plow. But eventually, grass-fed power gave way to steel workhorses fueled by steam and diesel — and a new era of agricultural efficiency followed. Now, rays of light from a new agricultural dawn are splintering the bucolic horizon: autonomous indoor farms tended by fleets of robots connected to hyper-efficient agro-hiveminds.

For a glimpse at this new twist on the farm workhorse, look no further than Iron Ox’s robotic farmhand nicknamed Angus. Angus’ job on the “farm” — a warehouse in Silicon Valley, technically — is to transport 1,000-pound trays of leafy greens growing in a perfectly-balanced hydroponic bath. Angus rolls through the Iron Ox warehouse hoisting trays into position for robotic-arms that can plant crops, add nutrients, transplant crops as they grow, harvest and ultimately package their bounty.

But Angus isn’t really “Angus” the individual. Rather, Angus is just one appendage of an entire robotic-software-sensor system controlled by “The Brain.” It’s a central computer that monitors the entire operation, from Angus’ next move to the nitrogen levels in tray 2. It’s all part of Iron Ox’s aim to build hyper-efficient farms in the urban centers where most food is consumed.

By locating autonomous farms closer to consumption, you already cut down on the fuel and labor costs needed to get plants from point A to B. But Iron Ox isn’t doing too bad on the productivity side, either. Their farm, on a foot-to-foot comparison, is about five times as productive as a traditional farm.

That’s because Iron Ox monitors every single facet of the growing cycle. Plants are given just the right amount of space, sun (the warehouse allows natural light in) and nutrients to grow. Because computers can run 24/7, the plants are constantly monitored and conditions adjusted to optimize growth. With the aid of machine learning algorithms, every additional crop improves the ability of “The Brain” to grow the next crop. Of course, it also helps that Angus doesn’t need to eat, sleep or collect a wage for his labor.

Iron Ox isn’t the only enterprise taking autonomous, robotic farming to the city. There are now dozens of startups putting their vision of urban farming to the test, and indoor farming is expected to be a $40 billion industry within a decade. Some are vertical farms that bathe walls of plants in LED lights. Aquaponic farms raise fish and veggies in a circular system: the fish poop and feed the plants, and the plants filter the water for the fish. But even old-school farms are getting a hand from robotic labor.

While there’s a lot of buzz about autonomous vehicles on highways, it’s the endless rows of farm fields that will likely first play host to widespread autonomous vehicle operations.

Already, precision-ag giants like John Deere are testing autonomous planters, sprayers and harvesters that chart daily routes and interventions based on data gathered by self-directed drones flying over fields and other real-time sensors. Indeed, though tractors still rule the farm, their days of dominance may be numbered.

• robotics computers agriculture gadgets artificial intelligence