The amount of money going into factories that grow leafy greens probably means I am going to have to work on my repertoire of salad jokes (a niche genre but big yucks with the right audience).
From FoodDive, January 26:
Dive Brief:
- Plenty has raised $400 million in a Series E funding round, which it claims is the largest to date for an indoor farming company. New investors One Madison Group and JS Capital led the round, which also included Walmart and SoftBank Vision Fund 1. Walmart and One Madison Group will join Plenty’s board of directors.
- Plenty plans to use the funds to support its growth strategy of selling product from its farms directly to partners. In a new strategic partnership with Walmart, Plenty will provide vertically farmed produce to the retailer's stores, including all of its California locations.
- Walmart said it plans to create a “new, market leading product category” in vertically farmed produce that’s available to shoppers year-round. Plenty's massive funding round and strategic partnership with the retailer quickens the pace of growth in the indoor farming space over the past year....
....MUCH MORE
We've been tracking this phenomena for a decade. Here are some of our posts in reverse chronological order. And here is the a TL;dr takeaway:
Always keeping in mind that vertical farms are growing the highest-value crops to justify their cost. So no beans or wheat or rice or potatoes or barley or any of the other crops that supply the majority of calories that humans consume....
