Our robots deliver Per Plant Farming - caring for each plant individually, saving 90% of chemicals.
Our platform is fully autonomous, and we are selling £3m this year.
Current Status
Providing initial paid-for service to initial customers. Commercial deployment of Wilma data analysis and intelligence platform. Limited manufacture of Tom per-plant monitoring robot. Prototype of Dick electrical weeding robot. In lab prototype of Harry planting robot.
Market
Arable farmers - initially in the UK, then Canada, the US and LATAM - over 200m Hectares.
Our initial audience are regenerative and organic farmers - 10m Hectares.
We already have 5,000 hectares of paying customers in the UK, and a further 100,000Ha who have signed MoUs and are moving to a contract.
Problem or Opportunity
Arable farming is no longer profitable without subsidy. Farmers are going out of business. To maximise yields they are causing irreparable damage to the soil and the environment.
Arable farming provides 75% of the world's calorific intake, and covers 750million Ha. Solving arable farming is a $1Trillion opportunity.
Solution (product or service)
Our farmer-designed service makes arable farming sustainable and profitable.
We are developing three small robots called Tom Dick and Harry, and their boss, the AI driven operating system Wilma.
We provide per-plant decision making, increasing yields while using up to 95% less chemicals and energy.
We provide this through a service model. Farming as a Service. We charge a per hectare fee to deliver a healthy crop for harvest.
The first part of our service - per plant crop mapping and weed detection - is already in use by paying farmers. Our next part is to kill weeds using electricity.
Competitors
Competing arable farming robotics -
DOT - Robotic arable farming in Canada
Fendt Xavier - Robotic corn planting system trialled in Europe.
Other in-field farming robotics
Ecorobotix - Precision chemical weeding for vegetables
Farmdroid - Robotic planting and weeding for sugar beet
Bosch - Robotic weeding for vegetables
Naio - Robotic weeding for vegetables
Tartan sense - Robotic weeding for Indian small holders
Competing arable automation -
John Deere concept autonomous electric tractor
Kubota concept X Tractor
Advantages or differentiators
Farmer designed, farmer focused.
Per plant farming
Focus on arable (wheat, corn,
Full service delivery platform (monitoring, planting, weeding)
Lightweight no compaction robotics
Zero chemical weeding
Service model
Finance
Direct to consumer service model paid annually or monthly.
We can charge £400 per hectare per year for the full service, and will be charging £150/Ha for non chemical weeding from October 2021.
We provide one monitoring Tom robot per 200Ha that lives on the farm, collecting data continuously. Our Dick and Harry robots will be delivered to the farm when necessary. Service delivery consists of robot 'handlers' and engineers running out of service centres.
Business model
Farming as a service. Charging per hectare per year to arable farmers.
Direct to customer chanel. Partnership via farming management service providers (in conversation with service providers in UK, Brazil and Canada).
Current hectarage - 300Ha (from Oct 2020) for monitoring and data analysis
2021 - 4000Ha for monitoring and non-chemical weeding
2022 - 12000Ha for Planting, weeding, monitoring and analysis
Money will be spent on
Delivering robust, manufacturable versions of prototypes for commercial rollout.
Winners - Europas Best AgriTech Startup
Winners - CogX AgriTech Innovation Award
Winners - Drum Social Purpose - Best Use of Technology Award
Winners - BT Tech4Good Connected Society Award
Invention/Patent
Application GB1913076.4 - Autonomous farming devises, systems and methods.
