机器人苹果采摘机的自动调整

随着机器人采摘机初创公司倒闭，一位主要投资者同意继续该项目。

Automated adjustment for robotic apple harvester

As robotic-harvester startup shuts down, a major investor agrees to continue the project. 

June 29, 2025
 

加州初创公司 Advanced.farm 正在开发一款自动化苹果采摘机，但今年春天，该公司因资金耗尽而无法继续运营，这标志着该行业应对不断上涨的劳动力成本的希望再次受挫。不过，几周后，其主要支持者之一凯斯纽荷兰工业集团 (CNH Industrial) 收购了这项技术，并计划继续开发。

华盛顿州树果研究委员会执行董事伊内斯·汉拉汉 (Ines Hanrahan) 表示，这对树果行业来说是个好消息。在过去两个产季，该行业一直与 advanced.farm 密切合作，并见证其发展到商业化的阶段。

“这一进展令人瞩目，它让我们对实现目标有了新的信心，也让我们对（自动化采摘）实际上，坦率地说，是可能的，感到兴奋不已。”

这台配备六个机械臂、每小时可采摘多达 3,000 个苹果的机器，其下一步将由凯斯纽荷兰公司（CNH）负责。凯斯纽荷兰公司是凯斯纽荷兰集团（Case IH）和纽荷兰集团（New Holland）等农业设备品牌的所有者。2022 年，该公司成立了凯斯纽荷兰工业风险投资公司（CNH Industrial Ventures），开始投资并与新兴农业科技公司合作，包括 Monarch Tractor、Bluewhite、Zasso 和 advanced.farm。

“在过去两年里，我们对凯斯纽荷兰公司有了相当深入的了解，我们相信他们将成为我们愿景的守护者——我们与果树种植者共同构建的愿景，”2018 年 advanced.farm 联合创始人凯尔·科布（Kyle Cobb）表示。“这将是一个延续。”

他的团队计划在本季度将新型号的机械臂数量增加一倍，并增加一个平台，供两名工人采摘机器人不可避免地会错过的苹果。但由于所有权的突然变更，这项技术的后续发展以及2025年收获季的计划尚不明确。

CNH 的传播主管 Rebecca Fabian 表示，CNH 计划从这家初创公司招聘关键员工加入公司的技术和创新部门。

她在一封电子邮件中表示：“我们认为 advanced.farm 技术的价值在于它能够解决劳动力短缺问题，并提高农业行业的效率和韧性。通过将 advanced.farm 的技术融入我们更广泛的创新战略，我们的目标是进一步推进机器人采摘解决方案。”

Hanrahan 表示，她期待与 CNH 团队合作——其中一些团队成员已经与研究委员会以及其他果树行业的人士建立了联系。

“他们是一家规模更大的公司，有很多不同的优先事项，所以我们必须考虑如何融入，如何合作，帮助他们提升项目，”她说道。

随着种植者发现劳动力成本持续上升，机器人技术的竞赛仍在继续。根据美国西北园艺委员会去年12月向《好果农》（Good Fruit Grower）发布的一项研究，仅在华盛顿州，过去十年里，使用联邦H-2A计划的种植者每箱苹果的劳动力成本就翻了一番多。（请参阅2024年12月刊的“苹果种植者劳动力成本新视角”）。

相比之下，同期美国经济的通胀率为30%。

在收购CNH的消息传出之前，《好果农》采访了两位研究委员会的董事会成员杰夫·克莱弗林加（Jeff Cleveringa）和基思·维塞尔卡（Keith Veselka），他们在过去几个种植季与advanced.farm密切合作。他们表示，已经饱受劳动力成本上涨困扰的种植者迫切需要自动化解决方案，但目前的行业经济状况使他们难以投资技术并支持初创企业实现商业化。

“作为一个州，我们的劳动力成本只会上升，因为我们的体制就是这样。因此，我们在世界上的竞争力正在下降，而自动化最终将成为我们赖以生存的关键，”克莱弗林加说道。“我相信业界人士都知道这一点，但我认为他们没有意识到，要接近这个目标需要多少资金。”

不幸的是，风险投资对农业科技投资的兴趣已基本枯竭，而许多商品及其供应商都在苦苦挣扎，科布在advanced.farm宣布关闭时表示。

他还赞扬了与果树产业和研究委员会的合作。“我们不可能找到比这更好的合作伙伴了，”他说。

鉴于当前的经济形势，克莱弗林加和韦塞尔卡敦促种植者与立法者讨论政府支持如何帮助所需技术跨越经济缺口。

“由于成本太高，我们需要某种政府援助，这在农业领域无人问津，但我们需要一些低息贷款；我们需要一些帮助，推动该技术从预商业化阶段迈向商业化阶段，”克莱弗林加说道。

现在提出这一要求的时机或许并不合适——因为州政府和联邦政府都在削减开支——但从研究委员会与其他国家农业技术开发机构的合作来看，更多的支持有助于种植者掌握新技术。

“其他国家都在投入大量资金推进农业技术发展，”Veselka 说道。“与世界其他国家相比，美国农业技术开发商处于非常不利的地位。”

CNH 将收购 advanced.farm 的知识产权及其部分核心员工的消息是个好消息，但 Cleveringa 的乐观情绪因收割机开发仍面临的更大经济挑战而有所减弱。

“我们很高兴看到这种情况可能会持续下去，从而改善整个行业，”他说道。

此外，Hanrahan、Veselka 和 Cleveringa 也表示，尽管苹果产业目前面临经济挑战，但经过多年的系统、品种和管理变革，它已准备好实现机械化。

“未来有点暗淡，”克莱弗林加说。“但暗淡会带来改变，而改变正是采用新技术的催化剂。”

Advanced.farm, the California startup developing an automated apple harvester, ran out of capital to continue operations this spring, marking yet another setback in the industry’s hopes for a solution to escalating labor costs. But, a few weeks later, one of its major backers, CNH Industrial, moved to acquire the technology with plans to continue its development. 

That’s welcome news for the tree fruit industry, which has worked closely with advanced.farm over the past two seasons and saw it progress to the cusp of commercialization, said Ines Hanrahan, executive director of the Washington Tree Fruit Research Commission. 

“The progress has just been phenomenal and it’s created a new trust that we can get there and a new excitement that (automated harvest) is actually, quite frankly, possible,” she said. 

Now the next steps for the machine, which featured six robotic arms capable of picking up to 3,000 apples per hour, will be in the hands of CNH, the corporate owner of Case IH and New Holland brands of ag equipment, among others. In 2022, the company formed CNH Industrial Ventures to begin investing in and partnering with emerging ag tech, including Monarch Tractor, Bluewhite, Zasso and advanced.farm. 

“We’ve gotten to know CNH pretty well over the past two years, and we think they are going to be stewards of our vison — of the vision we built with tree fruit growers,” said Kyle Cobb, who co-founded advanced.farm in 2018. “It’s going to be a continuation.”

His team envisioned doubling the robotic arms in a new model this season and adding a platform for two workers to pick the apples the robot inevitably misses, but with the sudden change in ownership, the next steps for the technology and plans for the 2025 harvest season are unclear.

CNH plans to hire key employees from the startup to join the company’s technology and innovation divisions, said Rebecca Fabian, head of communications for CNH.

“The value we see in advanced.farm’s technology lies in its ability to address labor shortages and enhance the efficiency and resilience of the agricultural industry,” she said in an email. “By integrating advanced.farm’s technologies into our broader innovation strategy, we aim to further advance robotic harvesting solutions.” 

Hanrahan said she looks forward to working with the CNH team — some of whom already have relationships with the research commission and others in the tree fruit industry. 

“They are a bigger company and have lots of different priorities, so we have to see how we fit in and how we work together and help them elevate the project,” she said. 

The robotics race continues as growers see their labor costs continue to escalate. In Washington alone, over the past decade, labor costs per bin of apples have more than doubled for growers using the federal H-2A program, according to a study released by the Northwest Horticultural Council to Good Fruit Grower in December. (See “A new look at labor costs for apple growers” in the December 2024 issue.) 

That compares with 30 percent inflation across the U.S. economy in the same period.

Before news of the CNH acquisition broke, Good Fruit Grower talked with Jeff Cleveringa and Keith Veselka, two research commission board members who worked closely with advanced.farm over the past several seasons. Growers already hampered by escalating labor costs need automation solutions, but the economics of the industry at present make it hard for them to invest in technology and support startups into commercialization, they said. 

“Our labor costs will only go up, as a state, because it’s built that way. So, our competitiveness in the world shrinks and automation will have to, at some point, be what keeps us viable,” Cleveringa said. “I’m sure the industry knows that, but I don’t think what they realize is how many millions it takes to get this close to the finish line.”

Unfortunately, the venture capital appetite for ag tech investment largely dried up while many commodities — and their suppliers — are struggling, Cobb said when advanced.farm announced it was closing its doors.

He also praised the collaboration with the tree fruit industry and the research commission. “We could not have asked for better partners,” he said. 

In light of that economic context, Cleveringa and Veselka urged growers to talk with their lawmakers about the ways government support could help needed technology cross that economic gap.

“Because it’s so expensive, we’re going to need some sort of government help, which nobody in ag likes, but we’re going to need some low-interest loans; we’re going to need some help to push from precommercial to commercial,” Cleveringa said. 

The timing might not be right for that ask, either — as state and federal governments look to cut spending — but it’s clear from the research commission’s partnerships with ag tech development in other countries that more support helps to get new technologies into growers’ hands. 

“Every other country is putting forward considerable dollars to advance their ag tech,” Veselka said. “U.S. ag tech developers are at a very strong disadvantage compared to everyone else around the world.”

The news that CNH would acquire advanced.farm’s intellectual property and some of its key staff is good news, but Cleveringa’s optimism is tempered by the larger economic challenges still facing the harvester’s development.

“We’re excited there’s a prospect this might continue for the betterment of the whole industry,” he said. 

Also, the apple industry, despite its present economic challenges, is poised to mechanize after years of system, varietal and management changes, Hanrahan, Veselka and Cleveringa agreed.

“The future is a little grim,” Cleveringa said. “But grim creates change, and change is the catalyst for adoption.” 

文章来源：榴苑