LIVERMORE, Calif. – November 22, 2022 – Praveen Penmetsa, Founder & CEO of Monarch Tractor, speaks at Web Summit 2022 on a panel hosted by Jennifer Strong. Jennifer is an award-winning audio journalist and the creator of several top tech podcasts including In Machines We Trust and the WSJ's The Future of Everything. AI and autonomous tech are reshaping the agricultural industry. In this session of "Robots will be running the farm", learn how two startups are pushing towards the future, taking us from factory to field.
Monarch Tractor builds all-electric, fully autonomous, smart tractors targeting specialty crops such as the fruits and vegetables market with a mission to make farmers profitable, allowing them to move the food ecosystem to sustainability. Praveen is quoted by saying, "it's hard to go green if business is in the red" and that "most small fruit and vegetable farmers are just surviving".
The outflow of talent in farming is causing major labor challenges. Technology is lacking for smaller fruits and vegetable farmers with tremendous margins pressure to invest in tech which Monarch Tractor is addressing with its driver optional, data-driven, 100% electric intelligent tractor.
Praveen also notes, "agriculture is the 3rd most dangerous profession on the planet" and Monarch's Agrobust technology is built to survive elements of the farm, working in all conditions such as spraying chemicals with human safety being on top of mind.
Watch the full panel discussion below.