Deal highlights

• Big data insights for small farmers in a subscription model to get farmers online quickly, simply and cost effectively
• $1.5M raised to date from partners including the Vatican’s Laudato Si Challenge, Blue Startups, Henk Rogers, Elemental Excelerator, Vega Ventures
• Recipient of highly selective $100,000 grant from the United States Department of Agriculture
• Saved a major apple grower his multimillion dollar crop and tens of thousands in heating propane and labor costs by giving him a 30 min early warning on frost to turn on wind machines and field heaters.
• In four states and two countries, with plans to grow to nine states and three countries by end of 2019
• Expanded initial success from 400 to 40,000 acres of farmland, working with the 2nd oldest and 3rd largest Farmers Union in the country, covering 3 states and 25,000 farms. Business model allows small and large farms to work together to mitigate frost.
• Team includes former employees KPMG, Google, HP, Electronic Arts, Peace Corp, Sierra Club, Syngenta, DuPont Pioneer, Ecolab, and come from all around the US, Brazil, Persia, Hawaii, Holland, Germany, and Australia.

Smart Yield's insights take the guesswork out of growing

The Small-to-Medium Scale Farmer’s “Perfect Storm”: Environment + Regulations + Time & Money

Climate patterns are becoming more erratic and excessive

These farmers can’t rely on anecdotal resources like the Old Farmer’s Almanac anymore. Extreme frost’s impact on an apple orchard wipes out five years of tending and nurturing. Both droughts and floods can place the small farmer in the same predicament of having to start over.

Time and Money. Money and Time

No matter  how you look at it, there’s no getting around it. Regulations that are formed to support and protect the small farmer pose an overwhelming challenge - any time needed to learn and practice takes away from the farmer’s dusk-to-dawn responsibilities. Certifications such as GAP (Good Agricultural Practices) and FSMA (Food Safety Modernization Act) will directly impact their customers (restaurants, distributors), who will shoulder the accountability for their customers.

Smart Yields leverages data from credible and timely resources plus original data from the farmer’s soil, topography and microclimates. This gives small to medium scale farms access to contextual and relevant insights.

Smart Yields believes very strongly that the user experience for the farmer is key to everyone's success. It is our goal to ensure ease of use, from on-boarding to implementing to receiving alerts.

The farmer will be able to view activity via a device agnostic application. The reports and trends are detailed and contextual to what the farmer has identified as important factors that are missing from their current knowledge base.

Smart Yields Leverages Data 

Smart Yields’ priority is to offer insights based on data from the farmer’s soil, topography and microclimates. This helps the farmer take steps confidently and make decisions that will increase productivity and efficiency.

We ensure that data is anonymized and sanitized. It is our attention to detail that enables the farmer to make better decisions and develop best practices.

Smart Yields’ Secret Sauce: The People

Our industry experts are well versed in agriculture and highly cognizant of how environmental sciences, catastrophes (both natural and human-induced) and geography can critically impact the small farmers' future.

Our product development team have experience ranging from Silicon Valley companies and global organizations. They are huge proponents of customer advocacy. The team’s user experience strategist makes sure that the end user is never forgotten.

Since its founding in 2015, Smart Yields has received international acclaim. The company was part of the sixth cohort of the Blue Startups accelerator program; selected for the 2017 cohort of the Elemental Excelerator; and was one of nine companies from around the world to present in the inaugural Laudato Si’ Challenge tech accelerator in Rome.

In 2018, Smart Yields was also named Hawaii’s Most Innovative Company in the U.S. Small Business Administration’s Awards, Editor’s Choice Category. Smart Yields also won the 2018 Pacific Business News Business Leadership Hawaii award for Best in Small Business.

Smart Yields is already being used by farmers, growers, organizations, nonprofits, companies, and researchers around the world. Here is what a few of them have to say:

• Smart Yields pools the data it collects from each small farm. Farms benefit from the breadth and quality of data that is accumulated (and anonymized) beyond their farms' physical footprint.
• This results in real time information that is useful as soon as the farmer views it, with insights that are highly reliable and relevant.
• Smart Yields offers multiple ways to consume this information - whether the farmer is most comfortable with a mobile device, tablet or desktop computer. We understand that creating access in the most familiar mode possible will add to the information's usefulness.
• In a world where efficiency and ease of use can make or break the farm's output and revenue, we want to show ROI that is realized quickly; for example:
  1. Significant reduction in time, travel, and manpower required for onsite monitoring and record-keeping.
  2. Information that will optimize inputs such as water, energy, and nutrients as well as reduces waste from crop loss and theft.

Methodology

Just as Kleenex is another word for tissue, Google is a verb for search, we want Smart Yields to be aligned with these descriptors: credibility, integrity, empathy and trust.

With each geographical area that we propose to approach, we will make sure that there are opportunities for us to engage with:

• Education: high school agriculture path, university Agriculture Science programs
• Community: agriculture-focused organizations such as Future Farmers of America, Slow Food movements, urban gardens.

We embrace the philosophy of contributing to the growth of a community, and to leave a place better than we found it.  

Our difference: we are hardware, connectivity, crop agnostic. - we are a data aggregator.

Smart Yields continues to expand its presence around the globe

In the past year, after opening locations in Europe and Asia, we are poised to capitalize on established relationships and successful trial projects. Funds raised here and elsewhere will go toward supporting small- and medium-size farms and orchards in your region and around the world. Specifically, we are: