Bowery, an indoor farming company that deploys a lot of high-tech solutions – including propriety software systems, robotics and monitoring plants via machine learning – announces it has secured a Series A funding round of $20 million from several investors, including General Catalyst, GGV and GV.
“Shaping the future of food requires re-imagining the food supply chain from seed to store,” according to Spencer Lazar, partner with General Catalyst. “The Bowery team is pioneering technology that will move the entire agriculture industry forward. We are proud to be in their corner.”
Bowery uses hydroponics practices it says uses 95% less water and is more than a hundred times more productive comparable to the same footprint of land of traditional agriculture. The company also calls the leafy greens it grows “post-organic” – that is, pesticide-free and grown in a completely controlled environment.
Perhaps most importantly – the food tastes good, Lazar says.
“Their produce tastes delightful,” he says. “Their farm economics are exciting, and the conscientiousness of their approach is inspiring.”
Bowery’s crops are planted indoors in vertical rows and meticulously monitored, “capturing a tremendous amount of data along the way,” according to the company’s website. “We’re able to remove the age old reliance on ‘eyeballing.’ We can give our crops exactly what they need and nothing more -- from nutrients and water to light.”
The company sells its produce to nearby restaurants and Whole Foods stores in and around New York City.
Bowery’s CEO, Irving Fain, says he’s thrilled by the level of support the company has received so far. In February, the company announced a separate $7.5 million in total venture funding had also been raised.
The vertical farming market has proven a lucrative one in recent years. According to one market research report, the global vertical farming market is expected to grow to $5.8 billion by 2022, with an annual growth rate of nearly 25% between 2016 and 2022.
