A farm in Silicon Valley which is capable of autonomously growing and picking leafy greens is about to be operational, reports BBC.
For the last two and a half years, Iron Ox has been working on perfecting its agricultural robots to tend its indoor farms. After first testing its systems on a small scale, the company is opening its first fully autonomous production farm, with plans to start selling its produce soon.
The farm is currently growing a number of leafy greens, including romaine, butterhead and kale, in addition to basil, cilantro and chives.
The robots tending these plants are Angus, a 1,000-pound machine that can lift and move the large hydroponic boxes in which the produce is growing, and Iron Ox’s robotic arm for harvesting the produce, according to TechCrunch.
The current setup can produce about 26,000 plants per year and is equivalent to a one-acre outdoor farm, said Iron Ox co-founder and CEO Brandon Alexander.
Indoor hydroponic farm can achieve 30 times the yield of an outdoor farm over the course of a year, using far less space, added the CEO.
The firm reportedly raised more than $5 million in total, including a $3 million round it announced earlier this year and it plans to start selling the produce from the first farm and then scale to more and larger locations over time.
