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SupPlant

Food · Afula, Israel · Founded 2012

SupPlant is an Israeli agricultural technology firm that provides advanced irrigation solutions designed to address water scarcity and enhance crop productivity. The company was founded in 2015 by Zohar Ben Ner, an experienced entrepreneur in the AgTech sector, who was inspired by the idea that plants could communicate their needs. His son, Ori Ben Ner, now leads the company as CEO, continuing a family legacy rooted in farming. All of the company's research and development is conducted on the grandfather's original farm plot. The core of SupPlant's business is an AI-powered platform that translates data from plants into precise irrigation commands. The company operates on a dual-product model. Its primary offering is a hardware-software system for commercial farms. This involves placing sensitive sensors on the plants themselves (leaves, stems, fruit), in the soil, and around the field to monitor plant stress, growth patterns, moisture levels, and climatic conditions in real-time. This data is uploaded to the cloud every 10-30 minutes, where proprietary algorithms analyze it to create and deliver autonomous irrigation recommendations directly to the farmer's mobile device or dashboard. This system has been shown to reduce water consumption while improving yields. Recognizing that 76% of the world's farmers are smallholders who cannot afford expensive hardware, SupPlant developed a sensor-less API. This service leverages the company's extensive database, compiled from over 2,000 growing seasons across 14 countries, to provide irrigation advice based on crop type, location, and local weather data. This mobile-first approach targets millions of farmers in regions like Africa and India, democratizing access to climate-smart agriculture. The company has successfully raised significant capital, including a $27 million funding round in March 2022, bringing its total funding to $46 million, to expand its global reach and further develop its sensor-less technology. Keywords: precision irrigation, AgTech, smart farming, water management, crop sensors, artificial intelligence in agriculture, climate-smart agriculture, irrigation scheduling, plant stress sensing, smallholder farmer technology, water conservation, crop yield optimization, IoT in agriculture, agronomic insights, sustainable agriculture, farm management software, data-driven farming, Zohar Ben Ner, Ori Ben Ner, autonomous irrigation