Agerris, an Australian AI-driven robotics startup, announced it has raised A$6.5 million (US$4.6 million) in Seed funding through a round led by BridgeLane Group, and including Uniseed and Carthona Capital
The round represents one of the largest agtech Seed rounds in Australian history, and will be used by the company to commercialize its robotics platforms, intelligent automated tools, and AI capabilities developed by the University of Sydney’s Australian Centre for Field Robotics.
Founded by Salah Sukkarieh, a professor of Robotics and Intelligent Systems at the University of Sydney, the recipient of the 2017 CSIRO Eureka Prize for Leadership in Innovation and Science, and a nominee for the 2019 NSW Australian of the Year award, Agerris has already developed two robotics platforms that can give farmers and ag producers cutting-edge air and ground systems that improve productivity while supporting animal welfare, and improving environmental impacts.
“About 15 years ago I started working on drones, Professor Sukkarieh told AFR. “At the time you couldn’t buy any in Australia and this work introduced me to a bunch of growers because we could detect weeds from the air. They thought it was good and asked if we could do something with them, so we started to move into ground robots.”
The first platform, Swagbot, is an electric ground vehicle focused on large-scale row and tree crops as well as grazing livestock applications. Using on-board AI tools, Swagbot can identify and eliminate weeds, monitor crops and pastures, and will soon have the ability to herd cattle.
The second platform, Digital Farmhand, is a durable, low-cost and autonomous robot that has been designed to aid smallholder row and tree crop farmers through automating on-farm tasks including non-chemical weed elimination, intelligent crop spraying, and yield estimating.
“Farmers worldwide will need to increase production through enhancing agricultural productivity, yet many often struggle to afford the best customised advice for their farm, leading to sub-optimal yields and efficiencies from their crops,” said Professor Sukkarieh, CEO of Agerris.
“Livestock farmers, meanwhile, face a number of competing and complex issues, such as high labour and fuel costs, as well as animal welfare and mismanagement concerns.”
“Our platforms help to mitigate these challenges and help increase productivity by giving farmers smart precision farming approaches, made possible through our advances in sensor technology and farming automation. At the same time, our technology also enhances animal welfare and environmental sustainability.”
Agerris plans to conduct initial trials of both its robotic platforms in Australia before turning its eye toward global market where it sees commercialization opportunities such as Southeast Asia and nations across the South Pacific where rising incomes and population pressure are driving up food demand between 59 and 98 percent by 2050.
“Growers worldwide are being impacted by weed resistance, climate change, low labour availability, high labour costs and the growing awareness for the need to use less chemicals and less energy,” said Professor Sukkarieh.
In Australia, the company plans to have a commercial offering ready to market within the next year. At the same time, on the other side of the world, Pennsylvania-based Augean Robotics just raised $1.5 million in Seed funding from ffVC, S2G Ventures, Radicle Growth, and others to advance its similar robotic platform, the Burro.
Using computer vision and AI to navigate farms, Burros are working alongside humans, acting as conveyors and automated in-field transport, in the production of table grapes, blueberries, cherry tomatoes, nursery plants, and other hand-harvested crops, thus enabling humans to focus on higher-value tasks.
“We really like companies in the autonomous and robotics sector that are built on an innovative tech stack that can be used to solve specific vertical, valuable and mission-critical business problems right now,” said Adam J. Plotkin, partner at ff Venture Capital. “Augean Robotics, by addressing the acute labor problems facing growers, fits closely within our thesis, and we are looking forward to working together.”
Uniseed also sees the potential of such robotic platforms to not only disrupt agricultural production models, but to aid in producing enough food to feed a growing global population, and to attract overseas investors.
“Uniseed are excited to support this investment in Agerris…” said Anthony Musumeci, investment manager of the fund. “… as it has developed groundbreaking technology that not only addresses the growing need for increased agricultural productivity but promises to radically transform the farming process and make Australia a world-leader in intelligent farm systems.”
-Lynda Kiernan