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“It is thrilling that regardless of all of the market shifts, KETOS is steadily rising and growing significant partnerships, not simply promoting the {hardware} and strolling away,” says Meena Sankaran, founder and CEO of KETOS.
KETOS not too long ago closed a $10M financing spherical, introduced in Might 2024. Given the newfound reticence of traders within the vertical farming trade following a string of bankruptcies and poor monetary performances, Meena notes that this additional demonstrates KETOS’s success on this difficult nascent trade and traders’ recognition of the know-how’s worth.
Meena Sankaran
“Sure areas and traders are vertical farming with a worldwide lens and maintain a deep perception in it. Regardless of seeing a wide range of our shoppers fall out of the trade, new traders are nonetheless coming to us and are supporting us,” says Meena.
She additionally notes that shifting forward, KETOS is being extra selective in its engagement with vertical farming to give attention to these which might be aligned with KETOS’ imaginative and prescient and values, which can enable all events to interact on a a lot longer-term footing. The corporate has signed a number of shoppers, many with 5-year contracts.
“The worth of KETOS’ applied sciences has by no means been discounted in all of this turbulence. It has principally been vertical farming corporations needing to unravel some enterprise issues. The vertical farming phase is holding, however the massive long-term gamers are revealing themselves,” Meena explains.
Completely different crops, totally different testing requirements
With KETOS SHIELD, growers can monitor greater than 30 parameters of their water in real-time. That stated, the know-how’s pace of adoption varies relying on the crop. As Meena notes, acceptance within the hashish trade has been slower as growers appear content material to characterize the feed answer however not proceed monitoring it afterward. In distinction, she has observed that shoppers within the greenhouse and vertical farming area are a large number of environmental parameters each minute, doing full analyses two occasions a day and primary monitoring each hour. Nonetheless, Meena sees unimaginable potential for KETOS SHIELD within the hashish trade and hopes that growers will come round to see the profit.
“We’re in a position to scale back operational expenditures massively by means of real-time monitoring and by extension, improved water and nutrient planning. KETOS SHIELD offers direct value financial savings, threat mitigation, improved recycling and compliance to supply a high-quality crop with fewer batch rejections,” says Meena.
Synthetic intelligence now woven into KETOS tech
AI has been a part of the KETOS platform since 2017, the corporate specialised in water intelligence and monitoring for a number of years. Two years in the past, KETOS constructed an operation intelligence module that includes AI and first trialed it in open-field agriculture, extra particularly with almonds and grapes. Over time, KETOS was in a position to take satellite tv for pc imaging, discipline mapping, and many others. and develop machine studying fashions to optimize yield. This synthetic intelligence module has been tailored for vertical farming, amongst different industries.
Further developments embrace software program releases and screening instruments for perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). To drive its future improvements, KETOS is actively on the lookout for companions within the vertical farming and open-field agriculture domains.
“Nutrient administration just isn’t going away. Water administration is crucial and is finest carried out by means of real-time intelligence, not reactionary and periodic sampling,” Meena concludes.
For extra data:
Ketos
Meena Sankaran, Founder and CEO
ketos.co
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