From HandWiki - Reading time: 4 min
iFarm interior | |
| Industry | Vertical farming, Hydroponics, Circular economy, Agricultural technology |
|---|---|
| Founded | 2017 |
| Headquarters | , |
Key people | Alexander Lyskovsky, Maxim Chizhov, Konstantin Ulyanov |
| Products | Software, technologies and equipment for vertical farming |
| Website | https://ifarm.fi/ |
iFarm (iFarm corp.) is an international company that develops software and hardware for vertical farming and hydroponics.[1][2] Its technologies are used for automatedd pesticide-free growing of salads, strawberries, and microgreens. It's headquartered in Helsinki, Finland with an office in the US.[3][4]
It was founded in 2017 by Alex Lyskovsky,[5] the founder of video game publisher Alawar,[6] and his friends.[7]
In 2018, the company expanded its facilities with a large-scale salad farm and a laboratory for strawberry production.[8]
In 2019, iFarm raised $1 million in a round led by Gagarin Capital.[9][10] The same year, the company moved its headquarters to Helsinki, Finland. It opened 8 laboratories and launched a small point-of-sale herb cultivation module production.[11]
In 2020, the company opened an office in the Netherlands. In July 2020, company became a member of the international Association for Vertical Farming. In August 2020, the company announced the raise of $4 million in seed funding from a group of investors.[12][13][14] In the same year, iFarm partnered with YASAI AG and Logiqs B.V. to launch Zurich's first vertical farm.[15]

In 2021, a partnership with the AlSadarah Group was announced to use iFarm technology in a pilot vertical farm in Al Khor, Qatar.[16][17]
In January 2022, iFarm and French scientific cosmetics company Capsum launched a sustainable vertical farming research project to create innovative cosmetics in France.[18][19]

As of 2022, the company helped clients create farms based on iFarm technology in 14 countries, including Norway, Switzerland, Germany, Andorra, Finland, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.[20][21][22]
iFarm technology relies on automation, sensors[23] and a proprietary farm management software, Growtune, to monitor and automate crop care, applying computer vision and machine learning and drawing on data on "thousands" of plants collected from a distributed network of farms, per iFarm.[24]
In 2022, firm released fully automated solution, that reduces the overall energy bill compared to traditional type of vertical farms due to a system that automatically "transplants" (refits) the grow space for the plants.[25]