June 3, 2020

By Lynda Kiernan, Global AgInvesting Media

As sustainability and ESG protocols and investment mandates take greater hold, it is becoming increasingly important that agricultural technologies advance to enable the continued meeting of benchmarks and goals.

Israeli agtech startup Greeneye Technology announced it has raised (a significant) $7 million in Seed funding in support of its next-generation AI platform that can detect and spray weeds in real-time.

The capital was raised through a Seed round led by Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP,) and included Syngenta Ventures, 2B Angels, One Way Venture, Panache Ventures Techstars, and Hyperplane Venture Capital. 

“We are thrilled to have JVP an international leading VC fund and Syngenta as a strategic and industry expert investors to help fuel Greeneye’s growth,” said Nadav Bocher, co-founder and CEO, Greeneye Technology. “Both our investors share with us the understanding that the way farmers spray chemicals in agriculture is about to be massively disrupted to a more efficient and sustainable manner.”

The act of crop spraying hasn’t changed much in quite a while. Worldwide, farmers still widely practice uniform spraying – coating not only any weeds present, but also an entire crop and the soil, resulting in higher cost of production and environmental damage, as well as driving the evolution of herbicide-resistant weeds.

Founded in 2017, Greeneye is developing an AI-driven platform that can accurately identify and spray weeds in real-time. This selective spraying system (SSP) can easily integrate into any existing agricultural sprayer systems through retrofitting in partnership with sprayer manufacturers, giving farmers the ability to deliver plant-level, variable-rate spraying. It also uses camera vision to map entire fields at plant-level resolution, giving farmers an affordable scouting tool.

“Our mission is to reduce the usage of chemicals that are being sprayed in agriculture, utilizing artificial intelligence to provide precise and targeted spraying in real-time, save money for farmers while increasing their productivity and profitability,” said Bocher. “Our trials indicate that our technology reduces herbicide usage by 65‒92 percent, which supports our mission to address these global agricultural challenges.”

Weed Tech Wave

Technologies that address chemical input reduction in agricultural production, and that can mitigate environmental damage, water pollution due to run-off, and pollinator loss are at the forefront when striving to raise sustainability in farming.

Agtech startups around the world are approaching these issues from a myriad of directions.

For instance, in Australia, the startup Growave is developing an alternative weed solution using microwaves that is extremely precise and ecologically sound.

“Basically, what it does is, if it’s an emerged-weed, it creates little explosions inside the plant and that, of course, kills the plant,” explained company founder Graham Brodie.

“If the seed is in the soil, what it does is it actually heats the soil and the seeds up to the point where the seeds actually die and they won’t germinate or emerge.”

And in Europe, RootWave, the developer of a method of using electricity to kill weeds without the use of chemicals, raised a $7.2 million Series A in January of this year. 

Founded in 2012 and headquartered in the UK, RootWave is the developer of a leading solution to organically kill weeds by using electricity to boil weeds from the inside-out, and from the root-up.

Pin-Point Precision

For Greeneye, it is pin-point precision that is being brought to the table.

“The future of weed control will enable growers to spray more efficiently and more sustainably, addressing challenges such as herbicide resistance and overuse of inputs,” said Shubhang Shankar, managing director, Syngenta Ventures.

“To achieve this requires a cost-effective solution that addresses real-world conditions. The Greeneye team has developed a platform that has the potential to solve many of the technical challenges facing row-crop growers, while applying industry-leading technologies that are scalable to commercial agriculture.”

The company plans to use the capital in support of its R&D programs, to expand its partnerships with sprayer manufacturers and other stakeholders, and to deepen its analytics capabilities and spraying applications.

It is also working to commercialize its technology following a string of field trials with farmers and multinational corporations that were contracted in 2020. 

“Greeneye is an example of digital agriculture at its best,” said Michal Drayman, partner, JVP and Board member at Greeneye.

“The unique technology developed by the company increases the yield for agricultural crops, saves money, reduces pollution levels; a groundbreaking breakthrough in sustainability.”

Drayman continued, “This is the future agricultural model, in line with the dynamic and demanding global regulatory requirements. Recently the EU has announced a new target to reduce pesticide use by 50% by 2030. We believe that the growing demand for environmental protection, along with regulatory requirements, are generating a significant market for Greeneye, including from the global players who lead the agriculture industry.”

– Lynda Kiernan is editor with GAI Media, and is managing editor and daily contributor for Global AgInvesting’s AgInvesting Weekly News and  Agtech Intel News, and HighQuest Group’s Oilseed & Grain News. She is also a contributor to the GAI Gazette. She can be reached at lkiernan@globalaginvesting.com.