Orchard Robotics Raises $22M to Tackle Agriculture’s Data Gap

In modern agriculture, the largest farms still make million-dollar decisions based on field samples that represent less than 0.01% of their crops. That reliance on incomplete data has long hampered growers’ ability to plan labor, apply inputs, and manage harvests. Orchard Robotics, a San Francisco-based startup, is betting that better information can change that equation.

Orchard Robotics just announced a $22 million Series A funding round led by Quiet Capital and Shine Capital, with participation from General Catalyst, Contrary, Mythos, Valyrian, and Ravelin. High-profile individual investors include Formula One world champion Nico Rosberg and Yext and Roam founder Howard Lerman. The round brings the company’s total funding to more than $25 million.

Founded in 2022 by Charlie Wu, a Thiel Fellow who left Cornell University to start the company, Orchard Robotics develops hardware and software systems designed to give farmers a complete view of their fields. “Solving farming is a data problem, and data is the bedrock of every farming decision,” Wu said in a statement. “But the lack of precise, actionable data is the bottleneck. Orchard Robotics exists to help our farmers become more profitable and efficient, and this new funding accelerates our ability to deliver a sustainable future for agriculture”.

Turning Images Into Insights

Orchard Robotics’ platform offers two core products: the FruitScope Vision System and FruitScope Vault & OS. The Vision System mounts onto tractors or other vehicles to capture millions of images as they pass through orchards and vineyards. Those images are processed by the company’s AI to assess growth, yield, and plant health across entire fields.