Innov8.ag, an agtech firm enabling actionable knowledge options for farms and agribusinesses, introduced as we speak the money and inventory acquisition of 2nd Sight Bioscience, an agricultural labor monitoring and stock techniques supplier.
Integrating 2nd Sight’s all-in-one labor, yield monitoring and produce traceability capabilities with innov8.ag’s already established ecosystem of agronomic and yield administration applied sciences will assist specialty crop growers and meals corporations plan smarter, act sooner and optimize their decision-making course of with end-to-end knowledge integration.
With growers and meals corporations going through quickly mounting stress from labor shortages, local weather change impacts, meals security and traceability calls for, and commerce and tariff disruptions, integrating and unlocking knowledge capabilities is crucial to sustaining operational profitability, stated Steve Mantle, Innov8.ag founder and CEO. Throughout the U.S., farm bankruptcies began ticking upwards in 2024, surging by 70% within the first quarter of 2025 in comparison with the identical interval in 2024, with extra closures looming.
“Bringing 2nd Sight beneath the innov8.ag umbrella offers growers and agribusiness CFOs a strong response to what’s maintaining them up at night time in the case of staying worthwhile,” Mantle stated. “It’s about bringing collectively the suitable individuals, gear and processes that flip knowledge into readability — within the discipline, within the packhouse and on the grocery shelf — at a time when agriculture merely can’t wait any longer for large concepts to show into actionable options.”
2nd Sight Acquisition Expands Labor Efficiencies Throughout the Innov8.ag Ecosystem
With the 2nd Sight acquisition, Innov8.ag ranges up their capacity to combine and layer knowledge throughout day-to-day agricultural duties in ways in which assist growers higher handle their labor effectivity. Innov8.ag’s expertise ecosystem already contains data-enabled options for soil administration, manufacturing practices and yield forecasting.
Labor shortages and prices are a very eager ache level going through growers as we speak, particularly for specialty crop producers rising extremely labor-intensive crops akin to berries, fruits, tree nuts and greens. Specialty crop growers in California, who provide one-third of U.S. greens and three-quarters of its fruit and nuts, have seen their labor prices develop by an element of eight during the last 12 years, in keeping with Walt Duflock, VP of Innovation at Western Growers and a specialty crop grower himself.
With labor a standard concern amongst home and worldwide growers, harnessing AI to unlock new knowledge insights from 2nd Sight’s labor-focused software program and {hardware} options are crucial to growers’ profitability.
“At 2nd Sight, we’ve all the time wished to not simply save growers cash, however make them cash. Combining our experience in labor and stock monitoring with the work Innov8.ag has already put in to make knowledge actionable for growers on the agronomic, yield and manufacturing practices stage unveils a complete new stage of insights that may rapidly be changed into each day beneficial properties,” stated Kevin Oldenburg, 2nd Sight founder and CEO.
2nd Sight’s well-known FairPick and FairTrak techniques automate harvest monitoring by weight, by hour and by piece charges, utilizing employee-assigned RFID playing cards and a rugged, tamper-proof, legal-for-trade harvest scale system to seize weighed crops, akin to blueberries, or scan per-unit or per-task knowledge, akin to a bushel of tomatoes or a row of apple bushes pruned. Each techniques generate receipts for farm laborers for accountability and routinely add information on the finish of the day for real-time each day harvest and job administration.
FairPick and FairTrak techniques are at the moment deployed throughout tons of of fruit and vegetable farms within the U.S. and internationally, with seamless assist in a number of languages and each imperial and metric measurements.
The 2nd Sight expertise platform additionally contains automated stock administration techniques for counting and monitoring nursery inventory, tissue cultures and produce, utilizing RFIDs, barcodes and a handheld scanning machine to depend and monitor stock, from the lab, the nursery flooring, harvest and to the grocery store.
With the acquisition deal, Innov8.ag acquires all of 2nd Sight’s belongings, together with their mental property, stock and buyer base, and can retain their skilled workers, combining 2nd Sight’s and Innov8.ag’s each day operations. Oldenburg will step down from his day-to-day position however take over as Innov8.ag’s board chair.
