Acquisition sees company’s vertical berry farm take another big step towards fully autonomous harvesting
Oishii, a pioneer of vertical farming for berries and tomatoes, has bought the world’s largest commercial fleet of harvesting production robots, in a move that signals its intention to reduce its dependency on human labour even further.
The New Jersey company, which operates the world’s largest vertical strawberry farm, revealed it had acquired the IP and assets belonging to Colorado-based Tortuga AgTech, as well as the addition of members of Tortuga’s engineering team to its own organisation.
According to Oishii, the deal will “turbo-charge” the output and efficiency of its robotic harvesting operation and help secure greater resilience in the face of climate uncertainty and worker shortages.
“Oishii and Tortuga AgTech are united by a shared vision for the future of agriculture,” said Brendan Somerville, COO and co-founder of Oishii. “By integrating Tortuga AgTech’s industry-leading robotic harvesting technologies with Oishii’s advanced indoor farming system, we expect to significantly improve yield outcomes and support our farmers with game changing data, insights, and harvesting power.”
He added: “Building on our partnership which has already demonstrated greater accuracy, speed, and completeness in robotic harvesting in Oishii farms, this strategic alliance will supercharge our path towards meeting the necessary milestones to grow exceptional produce at accessible prices in smart farming environments.”
Transformative tech
Founded in 2016, Oishii has sought to transform agriculture using vertical farming technology including AI and automation. Its farm in Phillipsburg, New Jersey, is already home to 50 state-of-the-art robots that work around the clock to pick strawberries at peak ripeness.
Its long-term partner Tortuga AgTech specialises in automated harvesting and autonomous robots. Over the past decade, it has raised US$55mn to support their development, and this has been credited with revolutionising the delicate and traditionally labour-intensive process of harvesting both strawberries and grapes.
The takeover deal sees Oishii acquire Tortuga AgTech’s highly effective advanced robotics technologies, including AI-driven models, frontier robotics software, and custom hardware.
These technologies will be integrated into Oishii’s own robotic systems, as it continues its partnership with another provider, Yaskawa Robotics, and the expectation is that the company’s harvesting operation will eventually be “truly and fully autonomous”.
This year, it predicts, robots will collect tens of millions of individual strawberries and, for the first time ever, will pick more of its premium Koyo berries than humans. As a result, it expects its harvesting costs to fall by half.
“Oishii’s passion for revolutionising the global agricultural system is something we’ve long admired and aligned with,” added Eric Adamson, CEO and co-founder of Tortuga AgTech. “Their uncompromised dedication and robust technological foundation has built a successful and inspiring international brand. Tortuga AgTech is thrilled to join their mission and bring the benefits of our combined technologies and engineering power to the masses at scale.”
