Hamilton-based 80 Acres Farms is cementing its partnership with global conglomerate Siemens, and the collaboration could help the fast-growing vertical farming startup expand its footprint “more rapidly and effectively,” its CEO said.
Siemens, a multinational tech company focused on industry, infrastructure, transport and health care, and 80 Acres made a big media splash with news of their partnership during CES, the Consumer Electronics Show held in Las Vegas.
80 Acres CEO Mike Zelkind told me the announcement broadly formalizes their nearly year-and-a-half relationship. Siemens Financial, the U.S. financing arm for Siemens, first participated in the $160M Series B funding round 80 Acres announced in August 2021. Over the last six months in particular, the partnership has escalated rapidly, he said.
At its roots, it will help 80 Acres scale faster. The collaboration involves multiple Siemens software and hardware solutions that impact 80 Acres' farming efforts, from building management and sustainability; automation; machine learning and artificial intelligence; research and development and more.
Zelkind said 80 Acres, one of the Cincinnati region’s top venture-backed companies, is leaning more into collaborations – particularly as VC spigots slow amid the broader tech downturn.
80 Acres itself has been a recent victim of job cuts, which it hopes will allow for more “focused, sustainable growth." Elsewhere in the industry, Infarm, Europe’s largest vertical farming company, laid off 50 last year, while Fifth Season, a Pittsburgh-based indoor vertical farming startup, shut its doors altogether in October. An employee cited the “challenging macroeconomic environment.”
“We always try to do more with less, and we don't have to reinvent everything,” Zelkind said. "Working with partners who have deep strengths allows us to operate more efficiently ... we can take something developed for other industries, use it here and go a lot faster, with a lot less cost and with much greater impact. It's not just lip service. We're really talking a lot about scaling vertical farming, and the Siemens announcement is huge, not just for us, but the whole vertical farming industry.”
Per Siemens, the collaboration with 80 Acres involves the “optimization, automation and control of its farming facilities and processes.” Siemens is working with the company's technology subsidiary, Infinite Acres, to support the industrialization and scaling of the company's proprietary loop platform – a solution that encompasses crop management software and algorithms, environmental controls, robotics and automation.
Infinite Acres built its loop platform in collaboration with its other tech partners, including Priva in the Netherlands, Ocado Group of England, and Signify, which develops special LED lighting for vertical farming. The partnership with Siemens will take the platform to a new level, 80 Acres said – from involving digital twins to advanced controls.
In its work with 80 Acres:
- Siemens smart infrastructure is providing power distribution equipment, while its energy and building management technologies within the facilities help monitor fire and life safety, security and power distribution systems, all from a single interface.
- Siemens digital will install a suite of advanced industrial automation technologies and "edge" devices to help automate the production line, while edge devices and human-machine interfaces monitor and update the control systems at the farms.
- Siemens digital industries software is currently developing a “digital twin,” like a SimCity version of an 80 Acres farm, to predict plant growth under diverse conditions as well as to optimize future farms for growth and shipping.
- And Siemens' R&D arm, Siemens technology, is leveraging artificial intelligence and machine learning to develop an app that optimizes software to identify irregularities, avoiding adverse conditions within the plants.
“Food is medicine. Vertical farming is an opportunity to turn this concept into a reality,” Siemens USA President and CEO Barbara Humpton said in a release. "In this moment of change and disruption – and in a world becoming increasingly 'glocal' – 80 Acres represents both the purpose and the power of the industrial technologies now readily available to us."
“We want to change the way the world eats, and that’s a really hard thing to do. By building a network of global partners like Siemens, we can feed tens of millions more people in a matter of years," Zelkind said. “The Siemens technology is so broad – they are uniquely qualified to really play across the spectrum.”
80 Acres Farms, founded in 2015, grows its produce indoors, year-round, with zero pesticides, using LED lighting, artificial intelligence, robotics and more. Its farms use 100% renewable energy and 95% less water than a traditional farm.
80 Acres in 2022 announced two new farms, one now in operation in Florence and another coming online this year in Covington, Ga., outside Atlanta, its largest to date. Overall, the company operates eight indoor farms with R&D facilities in Arkansas and the Netherlands.
Its salad blends, microgreens, herbs, tomatoes and cucumbers are sold at retailers including Kroger, Whole Foods, Fresh Market, Jungle Jim's Markets and Dorothy Lane as well as distributors including Sysco and US Foods.
The company to date has raised more than $250 million in funding, including its $160 million Series B in 2021, which, at the time, stood as the region's largest single raise.
