Photo by Amy Wellenkamp
eliminated by the LaserWeeder. To put that achievement in perspective, that number was at 100 million in November 2022. “Growers are continuing to see a huge amount of benefit from our LaserWeeder,” he said. “We were originally selling on a value proposition of just straight money saving dollars per acre, but we’ve now discovered a huge amount of yield improvement as well because the LaserWeeder doesn’t touch soil or the crops.” The CIT released its first of an ongoing series of case studies on the financial impact of agtech earlier this year. In the case study, the CIT collaborated with two grower operations to share quantifiable data of the financial value of Carbon Robotics’ LaserWeeder after one year. The case study found that in a span of eight months, growers not only reduced weeding expenses with the LaserWeeder, but also improved yield. One grower’s yields with several crops were improved by an estimated 10 to 15 percent - and up to 50 percent, in some cases. The increased yield came in the form of recoverable product and less crop damage from hand-weeding.
geographic expansion of the LaserWeeder product. A number of Western Growers members are already using the LaserWeeder, including Sábor Farms, Taylor Farms, Braga Fresh, Grimmway Farms, D’Arrigo Bros. of California and JV Smith Companies. Additionally, Mikesell said the company has plans to launch several products—completely independent from the LaserWeeder—later this year. As a Western Growers Center for Innovation and Technology (CIT) resident, Mikesell was interviewed by Western Growers at the end of 2022. And much like the evolution of technology, since then it has been full steam ahead for Carbon Robotics. The company has spent the last year continuing to build out its LaserWeeder units, even expanding internationally. “We have machines going to Europe now and Australia, and we’re already shipping across the United States,” Mikesell said. While Carbon Robotics doesn’t disclose the number of units it sells, Mikesell shared that at the time of this interview, the company had exceeded the milestone of 10 billion weeds
Photo by Amy Wellenkamp
16 Western Grower & Shipper | www.wga.com July | August 2024
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