New York-based indoor vertical farming startup Bowery Farming said on Tuesday it raised $300 million in its most recent funding round, valuing the organization at $2.3 billion as the pandemic highlight the significance of getting nearby food supply.
Vertical farming develops its produce in stacked plans in technologically controlled conditions, lessening the requirement for tremendous expanse of land and bringing large scale production directly in to urban areas.
While the new business has battled to break even in the past, the drop in technology costs, for example, LED lights, is changing the economics and energizing investor interest.
As per PitchBook information, almost $1.9 billion of global funding was put into indoor farming in 2020, almost tripling investment in 2019.
Bowery’s most recent financing round, driven by Fidelity Management & Research Company LLC, would be the biggest vertical farming bargain on record, in view of records kept by PitchBook.
The company’s leafy greens are sold in more than 800 grocery stores and it has two commercial farms in New York and Maryland, and a third going ahead this year in Pennsylvania, said Irving Fain, Bowery’s President and Founder. Fain said the items are something very similar or lower in cost than their natural alternatives, however declined to say whether Bowery was selling them at a profit.
“The genuine advantage of what we’re developing at Bowery is above all else, it’s totally pesticide free,” said Fain, adding that a huge piece of the power utilized for the homesteads is sustainable with an expectation to the make it completely renewable in the long run.
He said the new funds will be utilized to extend farms across the US, searching for global extension openings, and growing new crops and technology to develop things like strawberries, tomatoes and carrots indoors and close to consumers also.
Bowery’s investors include GV, formerly known as Google Ventures, General Catalyst, GGV Capital and Temasek.
