https://www.just-food.com/news/upward-farms-throws-in-towel-ten-years-after-founding-vertical-farming-business/ JF JF Menu Search [ ] [SUBMIT] [ ] [SUBMIT] Sections * News * Analysis[ ] + Features + Comment + Interviews * Sectors[ ] + Bakery and Cereal + Dairy & Soy Food[ ] o Baby Food o Eggs + Frozen[ ] o Ice Cream + Meat + Refrigerated[ ] o Fresh Produce + Savoury Snacks + Shelf-stable + Vegetarian and Vegan[ ] o Dairy Alternatives o Meat Alternatives o Seafood Alternatives * Themes[ ] + Artificial Intelligence + Cloud + Corporate Governance + Cybersecurity + Environmental Sustainability + Internet of Things + Robotics + Social Responsibility * Insights[ ] + Deals + Jobs + Filings + Patents * Companies[ ] + Company A-Z + Company Categories + Company Releases + White Papers + Videos + Buyer's Guides + Partner Content * Events * Reports * Premium Insights * Awards & Rankings * Magazine GlobalData * About Us * Advertise With Us * Contact Us * Our Marketing Solutions * GlobalData Reports * Visit GlobalData From Our Partners * Future-proofing food processing and packaging * News * Analysis Sections + Features + Comment + Interviews Latest + Welcome to the new era of private-label brands in the US + "My bigger concern isn't what we need to get rid of. 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By Simon Harvey [Simon-Harv] Simon Harvey [email_icon] [linkedin_i] [twitter_ic] [facebook_i] [Upward-Far] Upward Farms microgreens Upward Farms, a US vertical-farming business, has thrown in the towel ten years after the company was founded in New York under a different identity. The company started out in 2013 as Edenworks before transitioning to Seed & Roe and then Upward Farms. Employing aquaponics technology to cultivate microgreens such as kale and mustard, the controlled-environment agriculture business was supplying Whole Foods Market in the New York City area. Recommended Reports * ReportsLogo Reports Morning Goods (Bakery and Cereals) Market in Peru - Outlook to 2025; Market Size, Growth and Fore... GlobalData * ReportsLogo Reports Quarterly Beverage Tracker First Quarter 2016: The Netherlands; Comprehensive Quarterly Analysis ... GlobalData View all Companies Intelligence Whole Foods Market Inc Infarm A/S Prime Movers Lab View all Getting off the ground with a farm in Brooklyn, in 2020 Upward Farms revealed a new growing facility in the same borough. At the time, the company said it had just received $15m in fresh funding, including from Wyoming-based venture-capital investor Prime Movers Lab, taking financing to $20m. "It is with a heavy heart that we are announcing that Upward Farms is closing its Brooklyn headquarters farm and will cease to operate in the vertical-farming sector," founders Jason Green, Ben Silverman and Matthew La Rosa wrote on the opening page of their website. "We found that vertical farming is almost infinitely complex - as we tackled challenges, new ones emerged." Vertical or indoor controlled-environment farming is capital intensive, requiring external funds to finance the technology and running costs, including artificial lighting in some cases to supplement daylight. Most, if not all, companies involved in the sector are unprofitable in what is still a relatively nascent industry requiring scale and investment to remain viable and compete with traditionally grown crops. One such business is Germany's Infarm, which last November announced a restructuring to scale back operations in the UK, France and the Netherlands due to what it called "challenging market conditions", including rising energy costs. Co-founder and CEO Erez Galonska conceded in a May 2022 interview with Just Food that the company was not turning a profit. Future Crops, a joint Israeli-Dutch operation in the Netherlands, reportedly went bankrupt earlier this year, although Just Food was unable to verify the start-up's demise at the time. Agricool in France also threw in the towel last year, citing "insufficient turnover to finance the high structural costs", along with the "lack of volumes necessary to achieve an operating balance". Upward Farms, meanwhile, was also rearing what it called "hybrid striped" bass at its Brooklyn farm. In January 2022, the business announced it planned to build a new 250,000-square-foot facility in Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, without revealing the cost. The farm, to be constructed through 2022 and ready for completion "early" in 2023, was to add capacity for its microgreens and fish amid a plan for Upward Farms to target new customers beyond New York City. "Scale, productivity, and efficiency in the industry have remained limited by biology," Upward Farms said in a statement unveiling the capital investment, with an explanation around the technology the company employed. "What Upward Farms calls Ecological Intelligence is a proprietary microbiome technology that introduces a biologically-based reinforcement learning flywheel. By curating a diverse microbiome with genetic capacity for key functions, Upward Farms achieves an autonomous, self-optimising, and highly productive biological manufacturing platform." Share this article [email_icon] [linkedin_i] [twitter_ic] [facebook_i] Recommended Reports * ReportsLogo Reports Morning Goods (Bakery and Cereals) Market in Peru - Outlook to 2025; Market Size, Growth and Fore... GlobalData * ReportsLogo Reports Quarterly Beverage Tracker First Quarter 2016: The Netherlands; Comprehensive Quarterly Analysis ... GlobalData View all Companies Intelligence Whole Foods Market Inc Infarm A/S Prime Movers Lab View all [Simon-Harv] Simon Harvey Simon has been writing about the food industry with Just Food since 2017. Prior to that, he was a financial news editor at Bloomberg and Dow Jones for around 17 years, working out of bureaus in London, Singapore and Malaysia. 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