FruitCast raises €3.2M for AI-enhanced soft fruit farming

Added on 30 August 2023

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FruitCast raises €3.2M for AI-enhanced soft fruit farming

The UK - Lincolnshire, UK-based FruitCast, a startup that offers yield forecasting services for soft-fruit growers, announced that it has secured £2.8M (approximately €3.26M) in a fresh round of funding.

In 2022, Ceres Agritech provided £520K in initial funding to FruitCast to create the tool and assemble a team of research scientists and industry specialists. The latest funding of over £1.1M will facilitate FruitCast’s launch.

According to BusinessCloud, FruitCast, which underwent trials on UK soft fruit farms for the last two years, is set to launch in 2024.

FruitCast says it will use the funds to launch as a subscription system. Development will continue for six months and will offer early access in the 2024 growing season. The platform’s scope will expand to include various crops beyond soft fruits.

Investors in this round

The funding came from private investors, including Ceres Agritech, and support from Innovate UK’s investor partnership programme.

Louise Sutherland of Ceres Agritech says, “FruitCast has huge potential to make transformational change in the industry. Predicting the timing and yield of strawberries is critical but extremely difficult to do accurately resulting in significant lost sales.”