$42M For AI Sensors Inside Beehives

BeeHero, an Israeli startup that uses sensors to collect big data from beehives, has raised $42 million. 

It says the decline of the bee population poses a threat to global food security, with 70 per cent of all major food crops worldwide relying on pollination by the insects. 

BeeHero provides beekeepers with sensors that measure parameters like sound, humidity, and temperature in the hive and analyzes it with AI to detect potential problems, as well as pollination progress. 

Close to 100,000 acres of crops have already been pollinated with BeeHero’s platform. It serves growers, beekeepers, agronomists, and ag retailers across the US, and is in the process of expanding into Australia, Europe, South Africa, and South America. 

The funding will be used to further invest in research and development operations, and expand to new locations. 

“BeeHero’s mission is to deliver pollination accountability for commercial crop growers, by leveraging big data analytics and machine learning to help them mitigate pollination risk. Thus allowing them to focus on producing more food, securely, and sustainably,” said Omer Davidi, CEO of BeeHero.

“We have seen first-hand the challenges our growers face from insufficient and inadequate pollination. To offset this, more and more farmers are adopting new technologies to meet the nutritional needs of our growing population.

“Our Precision Pollination as a Service Platform is a crucial tool farmers can rely on to improve their crop yields. This latest round of funding will help us continue to support the agricultural industry as it faces some of its toughest challenges yet, and is another step towards building a Sustainable Agriculture Ecosystem.”

The funding round was led by Convent Capital, which was joined by General Mills, Cibus Capital (formerly ADM Capital), and other investors. 

BeeHero was founded in 2017 in Tel Aviv, and is currently headquartered in California, USA. To date, it has raised $64 million.