Growing Produce In Difficult Climates — iyris Is Here To Help
There’s no doubt about it — the world is heating up and the climate is rapidly changing. Of course, we need to cut CO2 emissions urgently in order to slow down and stop the disruption. However, we also need to adapt. That includes finding and creating plants that are better equipped for extreme climates. Enter: Iyris.
Iyris is a startup based in Abu Dhabi (UAE) and Delaware (USA) that recently announced a $16 million Series A funding round. The company says that “11 hot climate territories [are] already seeing positive results from our technologies” and that, in hydroponics, its growers are seeing 30% lower energy and fertigation costs. Furthermore, its SecondSky technology is “mitigating the harmful effects of radiation on crops.”
Regarding that Series A funding round, it was led by Ecosystem Integrity Fund (EIF) but also included Global Ventures, Dubai Future District Fund (DFDF), Kanoo Ventures, Globivest, and Bonaventure Capital.
“In just a very short time, we have brought our products to market and proven that they work. But we have a lot left to do and completion of our Series A fundraise enables us to take the next steps in expanding sales of our drop-in solutions for heat blocking and crop resilience to our grower customers around the world,” says John Keppler, Executive Chairperson of iyris.
“EIF has been studying the impact of increasingly extreme weather on agriculture. iyris’ suite of products are tailored for growers in harsh and volatile conditions, who have been underserved historically by AgriClimate Tech innovation. These growers, who often operate on thin margins, have few options to better manage their farms to reduce the risk of crop loss, increase yields, and reduce water and energy consumption,” Sasha Brown, partner at EIF, added. “We have invested in iyris because we believe there are few companies that have such tremendous potential to become a critical partner for a mass market of growers, as they seek to adapt their operations to withstand and mitigate changing climate.”
Iyris says that “leading scientists and professors at the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia” originally developed its technologies. Aside from the SecondSky tech that lets in the spectrum of light needed for photosynthesis while blocking harmful infrared heat radiation, the company “has developed plant genetics via a novel hybridization process that has the potential to breed resiliency to salinity, heat and drought across a broad range of crops, ensuring stress resistant, dependable food production.” They are trialling this, so far successfully, with tomato growers.
“There have been numerous attempts at large-scale, commercialized innovative agriculture. In some cases, those solutions are spot on. However, our thesis is that providing a drop-in solution to the existing farming infrastructure using the existing supply chain is often more effective,” Keppler told TechCrunch. “This way, farmers don’t have to change their behaviors. They can continue doing what they do best — growing their produce in their particular regions. Our goal is to make it a bit easier for them, extend their growing seasons, and increase their profitability along the way.”
“We’ve seen yields increase side-by-side tests quite dramatically,” Keppler, who was originally an investor in the company and then became its chairperson, added. “In fact, these are some of the only innovations that have occurred in this space for the better part of three to four decades, according to some of our customers, who are some of the largest growers in the world. And so what this does is it makes it easier and more profitable to grow crops in difficult conditions.”
It sounds promising. We will need this and a lot more like it as our planet heats up.
Images courtesy of iyris
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