SwarmFarm Robotics intends to launch its robots in North America this year.

Australian company SwarmFarm Robotics has secured $12m AUD ($8.3m USD) in a series A funding round, which it will use to launch its technology in North America and expand its SwarmBot platform with new applications. The investment was led by Conexus Venture Capital’s agtech fund Emmertech, based in Canada, with participation from Tribe Global Ventures and Access Capital. Existing investors including Tenacious Ventures, GrainInnovate, and the Grains Research and Development Corporation also joined the round. (Future Farming)

SwarmFarm CEO Andrew Bate said that the funding will help the company meet global demand for its products, particularly in North America.

“This funding helps us to move toward by meeting more of the global demand for our product”, SwarmFarm CEO Andrew Bate says. “I believe that our lead investor being located right in the middle of broadacre farmland on the Canadian plains, signals strong demand for integrated autonomy in ag across the North American continent.”

SwarmFarm’s SwarmBot robots, which can be customized for specific farming needs, have been deployed on more than 1.3 million acres in Australia, reducing pesticide inputs by an estimated 780 tons.

Bate added that the company plans to expand into the European market.

SwarmFarm also aims to facilitate the growth of its SwarmConnect network of developers, and plans to offer non-chemical weeding technology and action-based interrogation of weather data that adapts crop protection applications to current and forecast weather conditions.

Last year SwarmBot robots were successfully deployed to farmers who operated them for 64,000 hours.

Related Story:  A Spindly Farming Robot Scouts Farming Fields For Pests, Weeds, And Disease