Scotland’s Intelligent Growth Solutions (IGS) has today announced £22.5 million in a Series C fundraise to support significant global expansion as the business deploys its vertical farming technology to customers worldwide. At COP28 in December, IGS revealed that it would be joining Dubai-based partner ReFarm to build a game-changing 900,000 square foot GigaFarm in the United Arab Emirates, capable of replacing 1% of food imports to the country. New CEO Andrew Lloyd, former Deputy CEO, takes over from David Farquhar as CEO to lead IGS as it readies to deliver the GigaFarm. “This year will be transformational for IGS as…
Author: Matt Peskett
Matt Peskett
Matt has worked in digital publishing and media for over two decades across the science, technology, food and agricultural sectors. With a lifelong passion for growing his own food, Matt also produces 300kg giant pumpkins for exhibition and volunteers with the Royal Horticultural Society. He has a sizeable horticultural social media presence and has been a finalist in the Garden Media Guild's blog of the year and social media awards. Matt also dabbles in start-up investment with companies like Small Robot Company, Drone Ag and RootWave.
Freight Farms received orders for 95 container farms during the fourth quarter of 2023, a year-on-year increase of 83% according to an update released today by Agrinam Acquisition Corporation and Freight Farms. On a sequential basis, orders were up 111% from 45 in the third quarter and compared to 33 orders in the second quarter. “We are very pleased with our fourth quarter results reflecting strong momentum across our business,” said Rick Vanzura, CEO. “Order growth was well above plan and backlog¹ now represents approximately half of fiscal 2024 forecasted revenue. We also continued to make steady progress on key…
GoodLeaf Farms’ third Canadian location is set to begin full production with initial test crops planted at the facility. The new vertical farm in Montreal follows last year’s financing deal and the opening of GoodLeaf’s second facility in Calgary during the Autumn. The 96,000 ft² vertical farm in Montreal is not quite finished but the business has already planted the first baby and microgreens for its test rounds in readiness to start shipping produce to Quebec and Eastern Canada. The farm will produce more than two million pounds of leafy greens each year with 40 annual harvests of microgreens expected…
Developed by Emirates Crop One and measuring 330,000-square-foot in size, Bustanica is the world’s largest vertical farm. In this recent video, Bustanica’s General Manager – Feras Soufi – provides a short tour of the Dubai based hydroponics facility, highlighting its highly efficient closed loop system which helps the farm to produce 3000kg of produce per day.
Planted Detroit wound down business operations in July 2023 whilst reaching out publicly for investors to help prop up the 5 year old vertical farming company. Now the firm is up and running again thanks to new partnerships with Carmela Foods, Lipari Foods, La Grasso Produce, Frog Holler and FULFLLD. In an apologetic and somewhat emotive website statement by Founder and CEO Tom Adamczyk he lays the blame for previous issues with an automotive company that failed to build an automated growing system as it had promised. This left Planted Detroit with a lot of logistical problems that affected time,…
Vertical farming robotics specialists Seasony has announced the successful closing of its latest funding round, securing €1.5m (US$ 1.6m) in investment. The funds will allow Seasony to accelerate its product development and expand towards key markets in the Middle East and North America. The round was led by North Ventures and EFIO (Export and Investment Fund of Denmark). Alongside them several prominent and experienced business angels invested including Vagn Ove Soerensen, Torben Wind, Klaus Holse, Barbara Taudorf Andersen, Nicolaj Reffstrup (Look Up Ventures) and many more. The technology firm’s autonomous mobile robot ‘Watney’ automates core processes in vertical farms and…
A new company – Himmelgrønt AS – has been launched by Norway’s second largest retailer Coop Norway together with Norwegian ‘plant factory’ builders Avisomo. Himmelgrønt will be jointly owned by the firms and see the launch of a fully automated vertical farm next to the Avisomo offices at Gardermoen, Norway. Construction is set to commence in February 2024. Established in 2018, Avisomo is a Norwegian start-up company which provides vertical farms with a range of ‘growth stations’ and automation software that controls lighting, irrigation, and fertilisation. The technology firm even has robots that assist in the transportation and processing of…
You’ve likely heard of Tesla’s ‘Gigafactory’ in Nevada USA, but what about a ‘Gigafarm’? At COP28 this week plans have been unveiled for a 900,000 sq. ft ‘GigaFarm’ to be built in Dubai’s Food Tech Valley. An agreement between ReFarm™ and Food Tech Valley has been signed. Capable of growing more than two billion plants and producing three million kgs of food each year, construction will begin in mid-2024 with the site expected to be fully operational by 2026. The GigaFarm will support the UAE’s move towards decarbonising food production, replacing 1% of the country’s fresh produce imports. Dubai Food Tech…
With COP28 just two weeks away, Vertical Future has entered into a strategic multi-year partnership with the Dubai-based World Green Economy Organisation (WGEO) to raise awareness of vertical farming’s potential. The UN’s annual climate change conference provides the opportunity to showcase the vital benefits that advanced vertical farming systems and data can bring to the global fight against climate change and further, to highlight the need to improve food security, particularly in regions worst affected by climate change. Vertical Future will be a mainstay of the WGEO Pavilion in the conference’s Blue Zone, across from the United Nations Framework Convention…
UK start-up HotHouse Therapeutics is on a mission to produce drugs commercially via specifically engineered plant lines. The start-up’s technology enables any naturally occurring medicinal compound to be reproduced by a host plant, potentially creating high value crops for use in Controlled Environment Agriculture (a topic touched on by Professor Derek Stewart at the 2023 Vertical Farming World Congress last month). Some of the most potent drugs known to mankind are produced by plants, but issues such as accessing source material from rare plants and modifying the complex chemicals have meant they have been largely abandoned by the drug discovery…
