Amazon-Backed Startup Raises $21M for Greenhouse Robots

Indoor farming startup Hippo Harvest has raised $21 million in its latest funding round, with backers including Amazon‘s Climate Pledge Fund.

Congruent Ventures, Hawthorne Food Ventures, and Energy Impact Partners also invested.

Hippo Harvest uses robots and automation to create “controlled greenhouses” where produce can be grown with less water, fertilizer and energy consumption than typical large-scale operations.

Hippo’s greenhouse system features a “closed-loop…direct-to-root fertilizer system”, autonomous robots and machine learning to distribute fertilizer, water, light and heat to plants on a microclimate basis, distributing these elements to plants only as and when they’re needed.

According to Hippo, the system enables a 55% decrease in fertilizer use and a 92% decrease in water use compared with other large-scale farming practices.

The company said it will use the latest funding to scale its greenhouse tech systems and expand its product offerings to target growing different kinds of vegetables – its current system is designed to grow lettuce.

“We’re excited by the opportunity to scale our production and reach more consumers with high-quality, sustainable produce,” said Eitan Marder-Eppstein, Hippo Harvest’s CEO.

“Our team’s work over the past 12 months demonstrates our ability to create modular, cost-effective growing systems that can be deployed across the country.”

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Hippo Harvest currently operates out of a greenhouse facility in Pescadero, California.

Amazon first invested in the company back in 2021 and currently sells Hippo’s own-grown salad mixes through Amazon Fresh. Local grocery chains in California, including Guss’s Community Market, Rebyl Food and Mar-val, also stock the startup's greens.