Toyota Ventures Expands Funding for Agtonomy, Which Turns Tractors into Autonomous Vehicles
Co-founder and CEO of Agtonomy Tim Bucher was born and raised on a farm and was deeply immersed in his own farming business when he took a computer science course at the University of California, Davis, and became fascinated.
It was this parallel career in agriculture and technology that led him to launch Agtonomy, a hybrid autonomy and remote-assist startup that turns tractors and other equipment into autonomous machines, providing local farms with affordable, tech-enabled labor to operate that equipment.
The company emerged from stealth mode in September 2021 with $4 million in seed funding from a group of backers that included Grit Ventures, GV and Village Global.
Grit and GV returned to invest in the South San Francisco-based company and took part in a $5 million initial extension led by Toyota Ventures, with participation from Flybridge, Hampton VC, E²JDJ and Momenta Ventures. The latest funding brings Agtonomy's total funding to date to $9 million.
Having just raised funding, Bucher did not expect to raise money again so soon, but when he saw forecasts for 2022 suggesting that agtech would become the number one 'hot area' within a year and beyond, he decided to accept the offer from new investors.
“Five years ago it was hard to attract venture capitalists' attention to agtech, but now investors are showing enormous interest, and although we are just getting started, local agriculture needs help right now. The funding will accelerate our testing, attract additional partners and, in essence, speed up our operations and our ability to double the pace at which we move, which includes expanding the team”
Bucher expects to conduct 50 tests and double the company's staff of 20 people within the next few months.
According to him, using Agtonomy is as simple as calling an Uber driver. Using a mobile app, a farmer can assign a job to one of the tractors, such as mowing a field. He believes that autonomous driving technologies like this, along with what other companies such as John Deere are doing, will help ease decades of labor shortages on farms around the world.
The company has a small fleet of electric vehicles, which it calls a 'proof of concept.' They have been working on Bucher's Trattore Farms for a year, and farm work there is now almost entirely performed with these vehicles.
Bucher expects a commercial launch in 2023, with the company initially starting with several hundred tractors. For comparison, about 300,000 tractors are sold each year. Tractors can cost between $500,000 and $1 million, and companies such as John Deere typically target large farms.
By contrast, Agtonomy's autonomous vehicles will cost about $50,000, which, according to Bucher, will encourage large farms to buy many small machines that can operate 24 hours a day, are more environmentally friendly and do not disturb the soil.
Jim Adler, founding managing director of Toyota Ventures and executive adviser to the Toyota Research Institute, said in a written statement that "fully autonomous vehicles will become a reality on farms, where they are desperately needed, much faster than on city streets."
Similarly, Bucher believes that many autonomous vehicles today focus on 'convenience technologies,' while agtech companies are building similar vehicles that he calls 'essential technologies.'
“This is a kind of perfect storm of consumer demand, climate change, electrification and farm labor shortages. We can solve these problems much faster with agtech than with other types of autonomous technology in our lives. With our technology, it allows all of us to eat well”
"Agtonomy is a hybrid autonomous and tele-assist platform for agricultural vehicles. We work with well-known equipment manufacturers to turn tractors and farm machinery into autonomous and remotely operated equipment available to local farmers," the company said.
The world is at a critical stage. Healthy food is unavailable to three billion people. By 2050, food production will need to rise by 60% to feed the world's population (9.3 billion people). A severe shortage of skilled labor is driving up costs. Technological innovation is essential to do more with less.
Agtonomy's platform reduces the cost of repetitive tasks such as mowing, spraying and precision weeding. The company's solution offers expanded capabilities and a higher level of safety compared with conventional tractors. The technology is purpose-built for agriculture and land care. It is safe, reliable, powerful and intuitive.
The Agtonomy platform also provides data-driven services that allow local farmers to continuously improve while working under tight budgets and seasonal challenges.
"Our team has years of experience to tackle the greatest challenge of our time. Our team is results-driven and has a proven track record of past success. We are veterans of autonomy, electric vehicles, cloud services and agriculture, with extensive experience at companies such as Apple, Microsoft, Google, Dell, Uber and Cruise," Agtonomy said.
