Thai Sade, co-founder and CEO of BloomX, joined Cheddar News to discuss how the company helps farmers profit off of AI-based pollination technology.

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Pollination Tech Startup BloomX Helps Croppers Improve Profits

Let's take a look at another startup, shaking things up. This is so cool pollination technology startup bloom X raising eight million in a seed round, led by ahern agribusiness company working to solve an issue around the decline in insect pollination with crop growers being impacted by the shrinking wild bee population. While the startup saying it can offer a solution in the form of its so called bio mimicking pollination technology. And the company combining ai technology and other mechanical devices to help growers manage and gain control over the entire pollination process. So joining me now is ties today, co founder and ceo of blue max tie. Great to have you on the show so fascinated to hear more about this. Do share some more details with me about how your company is using ai technology and even electric vehicles to improve the pollination process. Yeah, so it's great being here christian. Thank you for the opportunity. My name is Tessa. They found in Sea of Blue mix. So basically our technological approach combines uh two main assets. So one is the ai of uh looking on the crop and understanding the right time to pollinate. Basically we look on a variety of parameters such as fertility temperature, pollen receptiveness to pinpoint the optimal window for pollination in every crop extrapolate that with environmental data that allow us to predict the like I said, window of pollination and every day during the flowering season and two complementary that we use is um mechanical application that, in a sense, mimic the natural creation process. So in every crop uh using an understanding the flowering mechanism were able to provide a solution that address that needs more optimally. Traditionally we use honey bees to pollinate, which are kind of generic pollinate. Oh that even when exists, which is not the case in every crop uh poorly pollinated many crops because you just don't have the right physical traits and the right to apply. Yeah, let me ask you this. Um I think a lot of people on our show, of course they care about the climate, they care about the health of the planet. They would be so interested in something like this. But explain to me in the research that you've done, what is the true market opportunity here? How much of a need is there for this technology? Yeah. So first, regarding the needs, there is two main challenges that we see today in in the pollination space, which is, you know, kind of one of the most important production processes uh to basically provide fruits and vegetables for about 85% of the crops that relies on insect pollination. So one is the shortage of honeybee hives to pollinate uh those crops, the plantation of the crops is always expanding much more than the amount of honeybee hives that we use today. And second is that honeybees are not optimally uh pollinating those crops, even when they exist and in good health, which is not always the case is. So those two main challenges led us to find a solution that can address uh different kinds of crops, different flowering mechanism and basically the opportunities to provide better outcomes better. It's um and to show the value in better productivity which in a sense give more for the global uh put lower stress on the bees and utilize the land better. And therefore we have this triangle of a sustainable approach that provides this, you know sustainable and safe financial and economical type benefits. So let's talk about some of the growers, I'm curious what growers around the world are using this technology and how do you plan to expand? Are there certain geographic regions where the technology is more present than others? Yeah so we have been working for a few years now validating the technologies with major goals uh clients that we have in latin America, uh South africa, um um europe and also the U. S. So we've mainly been focusing on validating and now entering to the commercial phase starting to ramp up the activity many blueberries and avocados and now we're working on other crops uh in the greenhouses uh and and other crops that can benefit from pollination process is better. Uh And then the vision is you know it's kind of wide to see the value we have in different crops with different solution approaches and to provide on the way different technologies to solve those challenges. Alright tie sad co founder and Ceo blue max joining all the way from Israel Ty Thank you, We appreciate it and pretty cool stuff there.