Agriculture is exposed to a complex tangle of laws, trade agreements, and competing visions of the future. For farmers, adjustments by legislators at any level of government can have an impact. So while policy is often an afterthought for operators in tech, the pressure for farmers to be engaged and represented in the formulation of new policy is real.
Back in May, we published an experimental bonus episode called “The Three Fears of Farm Data”. The conversation centered around the legitimacy of fears held by farmers about sharing their farm data, and kicked off with a particularly hot take:
“We in agtech have completely f*****d farmers by making them afraid of sharing their data.”
The episode got a huge reaction from around the industry - both positive and critical. It’s clear that the conversation around farm data is one that everyone in agtech, from farmers and startups to analysts and operators in agribusinesses, seem interested in continuing.
Autonomous farming equipment and robotics in ag is more crowded than ever. Every new acquisition from an incumbent or deployment of venture capital into the space creates more buzz to sort through in the inboxes of analysts, entrepreneurs, and farmers.
With the industry growing so quickly, it’s helpful to have a bird’s-eye view of what’s happening, and what it means for the future of agriculture.
So, in this week’s episode we give listeners a framework to understand the rapidly moving world of autonomy in ag. Our guest is Andrew Bate, Co-Founder and CEO of SwarmFarm Robotics, who joins us to share his observations on the three major categories of autonomy that are emerging in ag.
When it comes to designing carbon programs in agriculture, there is a very real tension between the science and the commercial realities of drawing down carbon at scale. Particularly, the question of how to incentivize on-farm practice changes is one that many companies in ag carbon have failed to answer.
Working at the intersection of these tensions is our guest this week, Emma Fuller, Carbon and Ecosystem Services Portfolio Leader at Corteva Agriscience. An accomplished data scientist and ecologist, Emma began her career in agrifood systems publishing research on West Coast fisheries in the US, before jumping into the world of startups at Granular. After their $300M acquisition by what is now Corteva Agriscience, today Emma designs programs that credit farmers for reducing greenhouse gas emissions or sequestering carbon in their soils.
For a traditionally low innovation industry, things are starting to heat up in agricultural insurance.
While it remains something of a black box for many people in agriculture, the forces of climate change and technological innovation are creating the right mix of incentives that could change how the whole industry manages risk.
This second episode of our exploration of ag insurance considers a digitally-native product in the hands of farmers today. While still in their infancy, these digitally-native reimaginings of insurance as it exists will be the difference between farmers spending hours, days, and weeks dealing with brokers and getting payouts, compared to almost instant quotes, claims, and reimbursements.
It isn’t surprising that most farmers have to be expert planners and investors. But getting an inside view into how a farmer plans for the future of their business is a rare opportunity.
In this episode, you’ll hear firsthand how Hallie Shoffner, a sixth-generation row crop farmer in the Mississippi Delta, makes decisions for her farm and company, SFR Seed. While Hallie is an enthusiastic adopter of new farming innovations, this conversation shows that every decision must be well supported by reliable data and the right incentives.
Have we in agtech completely f*****d farmers by making them afraid of sharing their data?
Listen in to Matthew Pryor and Sarah Nolet from Tenacious Ventures, and Shane Thomas, agronomist and author at Upstream Ag Insights, work through an emerging theory that uncertainty and fear about farm data is a largely unfounded barrier to adoption.
There are many different views about the future of autonomous farming. One is that, out of the emerging autonomous equipment providers and established blue chip suppliers, there will be clear winners and losers in the battle for on-farm dominance. Another is that farming in the future will involve all kinds of autonomous solutions. This second possibility presents tons of opportunities to add value for farmers.
Our guest on this week’s episode is Iftach Birger, Co-Founder and COO at FieldIn, a farm data and autonomous equipment startup founded in Israel. Rather than wade into the fray playing out between new autonomous equipment players and established corporations, FieldIn is attempting to create a platform that allows a mixed fleet of equipment to interact seamlessly.
Biologicals in agriculture have a wildly exciting future. It’s a segment responding to innovation in science, changes in markets, and the urgent pressures of adapting to climate change. And while the buzz from new entrants inspires thinking about the future, New Edge Microbials (NEM) is an established player with products in the hands of farmers today.
Managing Director and veteran agribusiness executive Ben Barlow has spent years executing a growth strategy that has weathered all of these forces, plus the additional logistics chaos of COVID-19 in recent years.
According to Jessie Deelo, Chief Hub Officer at Vayda, leading companies are moving toward sustainability targets that are measurable, integrated, and connected to the real world challenges of on-farm sustainability. In her work improving the environmental and social impact of supply chains, Jessie is seeing a huge opportunity for farmers that already embrace sustainable production methods to connect with brands that need inputs with impact.
AgTech companies make promises to investors to grow fast and be quick to iterate or change direction. But they also make promises to customers who think more in seasons instead of product development cycles, and who value long-term relationships with a mutual investment. These are difficult pressures for agtech marketers to manage.
Managing the genetic quality of a herd can be a wicked challenge for Australian farmers. We’re a country with a small number of animals relative to the rest of the world, and formidable, complex biosecurity protocols.
Fortunately, Belinda Cardinal, Founder of breeding and genetics company Caprotek and career dairy goat farmer, enjoys spending time on wickedly difficult problems. After years spent strengthening the genetic diversity of her herd of dairy goats, Belinda attracted all kinds of coverage after importing the genetic material to breed the nation’s first Valais Blacknose Sheep in 2021.
It’s fair to say most entrepreneurs (and farmers!) aren’t big fans of government rules and regulations for fear of being slowed down by red tape and bureaucracy. However, the political environment in which a startup develops can have a big impact on its ability to find investment and support, especially in agtech, where ecosystems are still very new for most countries.
The United Arab Emirates is investing heavily in agtech, seeking to make Abu Dhabi the global center for innovation in agriculture. Salvatore Lavallo is the Head of Foreign Direct Investment at the Abu Dhabi Investment Office. He’s had a unique, and perhaps unlikely journey, to this position. Growing up in Indiana, his interest in economic development led him to become, at the age of 27, one of the youngest people to travel to every country in the world. Along the way, he became a farm owner in Tanzania, and a consultant with McKinsey in Africa and the Middle East.
Where are all the women founders in agtech, especially at later-stage startups? What does an acquisition really feel like, and when does it make sense? In this Bonus episode, we answer both these questions, as well as build on the key insights from our latest series: “Later-Stage Agtech Startup Lessons”.
This episode features Anastasia Volkova , co-founder and CEO of Regrow, an independent measurement reporting and verification platform. Regrow, (formerly Flurosat), recently acquired US agtech company, Dagan, and raised $17 million in Series A funding.
Farmers Business Network is one of the most well-funded startups in agtech. Just recently, they announced a $300M Series G round, bringing their total funds raised to $870M and their valuation to nearly $4 billion.
So, where did it all begin?
In this episode, FBN co-founder and Chief Innovation Officer, Charles Baron, explains how his Silicon Valley upbringing unexpectedly collided with rural Nebraska, resulting in an idea for a new kind of agribusiness- one that would connect farmers and increase their bargaining power for chemicals and seeds.
Charles talks about several key factors in the company’s success, including questioning Silicon Valley’s ‘founder obsession’ to instead create a ‘farmer-centric’ ideology.
Paul Lightfoot is a serial entrepreneur who has learned several lessons the hard way, from raising money to communicating purpose to hiring (and firing). After spending much of his career as a software CEO, Paul wanted to follow his “calling” to enter the world of sustainability and foodtech.
But this meant moving from a familiar career trajectory to an industry that, 10 years ago when Paul was entering it, barely even existed. In 2011, Paul founded BrightFarms, which uses hydroponic greenhouses to produce locally sourced packaged salads in the US. Along the way, he has made several critical decisions for his startup’s success, including voluntarily stepping back from the role of CEO.
In this 3-part series, we’ll share the lessons from agtech startup founders who have grown their agtech companies from idea to at least 100 employees.
This episode features Michael Gilbert, CEO and founder of Semios, a crop management platform initially focused on tree fruit, nuts and vines, based in Canada. Michael has a PhD in chemistry and started his career in pharmaceuticals and biotech, before realizing his knowledge could be applied to agricultural inputs.
This initial idea has led him on a journey from biologicals, to creating a company with more than 300 employees and over $225 million in external capital raised to date.
Does the average citizen actually need to care about how their food is produced? This is the central question Australian author and journalist, Gabrielle Chan, set out to answer. Her latest book, “Why you should give a f*ck about farming” details her firm conclusion, that yes, if you eat food, you should in fact care about agriculture.
While the old days of agriculture as the top contributor to GDP is over for most Western countries, Gabrielle argues the future of food and farming is becoming increasingly important for a raft of other reasons such as climate change and food security.
