Oakland, Calif.-based Ceres Imaging has raised $5 million in a Series A investment led by Romulus Capital. The startup uses cameras, sensors and software to pinpoint crop stress in the field for farmers, so that they can apply herbicides, pesticides and irrigation just where it’s needed.
Ceres, like several other startups, started out with the notion to build a drone just for agricultural use. However, according to CEO and founder Founder Ashwin Madgavkar, the company quickly realized commercial farmers needed to cover thousands of acres, proving too big a job for most drones.
Instead, Madgavkar said, the company has developed a proprietary sensor and camera which pilots in traditional aircraft, like Cessnas, can fly over vast swathes of farmland every day.
Besides its sensors, the company has created image analyzing software that can zero in on just the vegetation, leaving out soil and shadows in post-processing analysis. “We translate spectral signatures into what’s happening on the ground,” the CEO said. The company has worked closely with researchers and data from UC Davis to perfect its analytics.
Romulus Capital founder Krishna K. Gupta said Ceres…