

FarmLogs Raises $4M Series A To Further Advance Farming Into The Age of Apps - vollmarj
http://techcrunch.com/2014/01/15/farmlogs-raises-4m-series-a-to-bring-farming-into-the-age-of-apps/

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ajju
5% of farms in the U.S. are using Farmlogs! That's insane!

Congratulations to two of the nicest founders I have met and their team :)

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thematt
Absolutely impressive. I'm an investor in an agricultural (non-software)
startup and what people may not appreciate is the sales process required to
make in-roads in this industry. Farmers can be very skeptical (rightly so)
about anything that may disrupt their ability to yield crop. It can also be a
very high-touch industry in which you need to give face time to your end
users. The corollary to this is that once you've proven yourself -- your
competition has a deep moat to overcome to take you out.

~~~
conorclearshot
Would you have interest in a tractor drawn, in-field mobile hemp decorticator
that is being developed by Canfiber in BC?

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timlin
I live on a small farm and know quite a few farmers socially. The 5% number
seems hard to believe.

According to Wikipedia[1], there were 2.2 million farms in 2007. Since the
number of farms is decreasing (land development, consolidation, etc), let's
say today there are only 2 million. At 5%, that's 100k farms on FarmLogs.
That's impressive. I wonder how many of them are paying customers?

Especially given that most farmers I know are older (think Baby Boomer age)
and are barely competent using the Internet never mind an app/SAAS like this.

1 -
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture_in_the_United_Stat...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture_in_the_United_States)

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rmason
The number of farmers is essentially meaningless because of the way the USDA
counts who is a farmer. Anyone with sales of over $1000 per year is considered
a farmer and that is how they get the 2 million farmers number.

[http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/farm-economy/farm-
household-w...](http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/farm-economy/farm-household-
well-being/glossary.aspx#.UtbSeZ6wI7s)

What is more meaningful is to look at farms with sales of $250,000 per year or
more. They're 9% of farms but account for 80% of sales. There are roughly
125,000 farms in this group.

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timlin
Sure, you're making my point exactly. The soundbite "5% of farms in the US are
using Farmlogs" sounds impressive doesn't really mean much without further
qualification. In fact, I find it misleading. So did you, evidently.

There are two (at least) different definitions of "farm." One is large
commercial business often utilizing a thousand acres or more. I suppose these
are FarmLogs' focus?

The other is family-operated (except for seasonal help perhaps), typically
less than 250 acres. I live in Lancaster County, PA where farms average 78
acres. The farm I live on (and operate) is ~50 acres and has crop & animal
revenue far less than $100k. But it's still a viable farm.

Average revenue per farm in Lancaster County is $183k. That's another almost
meaningless number without knowing the distribution. I'd guess 10% of the
farms I know are much more than $250k.

[http://www.lancasterfarmlandtrust.org/heritage/farming-
lanca...](http://www.lancasterfarmlandtrust.org/heritage/farming-
lancaster.html)

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reustle
Hey Lancaster county, Berks county here. I'd love to hear about how much tech
you use on your farm, and if you're active in moving to use more. Are you a
generally tech minded person? A developer?

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minimax
I wonder how much the Climate Corporation acquisition did to boost investor
interest in ag tech startups? Also glad to see success from a Midwestern
startup. Congratulations FarmLogs!

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uptown
One thing I've seen before, but never quite understood, is how a company like
this can exist, but have a position for "Lead Engineer" open on their jobs
page. Is it usually the case that their previous lead engineer moved onto
something else, or that they bootstrapped a functional version until this
point, and now they need someone with more experience leading a team?

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vollmarj
It is simply that our CTO is mature enough to recognize that process and
engineering management isn't his strong suit and that he needs to be able to
double down on architecture. A great lead engineer will help stay efficient as
we add more amazing people to the team. We already have really great hackers
on the team and are looking to add more.

~~~
uptown
Gotcha. Didn't intend for my question to come across as critical (if it did).
Think I first read about you guys from Inc. Seems like you're positioned to
accomplish really great things. Thanks for your response, and congratulations
on the new funding.

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jonlucc
I think this is such a neat business. The farmers I've met are fairly savvy
business-people and will probably be very happy to have better information
about their business in a way that Quickbooks and Excel can't easily provide.

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hoi
Sounds very similar to Nokia Life Tools which launched in India back in 2009 -
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_Life_Tools](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_Life_Tools)
"The agricultural part of the service consists of localized information
including weather conditions, advice about crop cycles, general tips and
techniques, as well as market prices for crops. Farmers in the pilot scheme
said getting daily prices on their phones reduced their dependency on agents
for basic information, enabling them to negotiate with greater confidence."

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muxxa
From a tech savvy farmer friend:

> Yep it is USA only but it's interesting. Especially the market watch on
> grain price. Farmers never have a notion what the worldwide price for barley
> is even thou they sell it.

> Also the farm log on field performance is something that would work on a
> smaller irish scale.

> There would be a definite appetite for something like that.

I don't understand why apps such as this are limited to US only? There are
plenty of early adopters in the rest of the world.

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gaius
The ironic thing is if they had written FarmVille, they'd have raised $4Bn. VC
priorities are crazy.

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protomyth
The article has a bit of an error when saying current offerings all require
PCs. Some of the big companies in Ag have serious websites that do not require
PCs that help track finances, crops, fields, and even let farmers sign
contracts on the web.

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bdavisx
It might just be some poor editing, I think they are talking about the leading
large farm software, which I believe is this:
[http://www.fbssystems.com/](http://www.fbssystems.com/) \- written in VB.net
and Windows based.

~~~
protomyth
I'm more inclined to think its poor research and I will bet that the reporter
did not try to contact the big ag companies to find out about competing
offerings.

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bitsweet
Congrats Jesse, Brad, and team!

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fudged71
It seems a bit like you're doing to farming what PetroFeed is doing to Oil &
Gas. Great work!

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tohann
Wow, huuuuge congrats to FarmLogs! This should be a very exciting year for you
guys!

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mangoman
Congrats to Jesse and Brad and the rest of FarmLogs!

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infecto
Congrats Jesse and team! Great group of guys.

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danso
Congrats, and a great pursuit that may not be SnapChat famous, but may have an
easier and much needed value proposition. Modern farm machinery is pretty-well
wired, but it's also believable that the systems to organize and make use of
such data could be improved. Modern combines are fun to ride around in...like
a truck, except relatively safe to watch movies while driving given the speeds
involved.

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conorclearshot
Identifying and creating efficiency in agriculture is one of the backbones of
civilization :)

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ajaymehta
Big congrats, guys! :)

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mjhea0
Congrats, Jessie! :)

