Key facts
- Mitti Labs raised $9.5 million in Series A funding, led by Aramco Ventures.
- The startup's platform uses AI and satellite imagery to help rice farmers reduce water use and methane emissions.
- The funding will support expansion into the Philippines, Indonesia, and other Southeast Asian markets.
- Mitti Labs aims to reach millions of smallholder farmers by 2030.
- The company generates revenue from carbon credits and its GeoAI platform.
Mitti Labs, a climate-tech startup headquartered in New York and Bengaluru, has secured $9.5 million in Series A funding to enhance water resilience in Asia's rice farming sector. The round was led by Aramco Ventures, the investment arm of Saudi Aramco, with participation from existing investor Lightspeed India, Godrej Industries Group, Cisco, Francis Family Fund, and Volta Circle. This brings Mitti Labs' total funding to $12.5 million, including a $3 million seed round from July 2024.
Rice cultivation, a staple for over half the world's population, is highly water-intensive and a significant contributor to agricultural methane emissions. Mitti Labs addresses these challenges with its GeoAI platform, which integrates satellite radar imagery with extensive field data. This technology creates digital twins of smallholder farms, enabling remote monitoring of crop conditions, water usage, and methane emissions.
The platform utilizes synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery from various satellites, combined with proprietary datasets trained to analyze crop growth, soil moisture, and flooding. Co-founder Xavier Laguarta highlighted that the startup's strength lies in its AI models and the datasets built to train them.
Mitti Labs has scaled its operations from 8,000 farmers in its first season in 2024 to over 100,000 farmers across several Indian states this season. The company aims to reach millions of smallholder farmers by 2030, supported by a team of over 150 employees, primarily based in India, who work directly with farmers to implement alternate irrigation practices.
These practices, according to Mitti Labs, can reduce water consumption by approximately 40% and methane emissions by over 50% without impacting crop yields. The company also generates revenue through carbon credits, which offer farmers an additional income stream, and its GeoAI platform. Customers include carbon marketplace Cool Effect, rice producer Ebro Foods, and agricultural company Syngenta, who leverage Mitti Labs' data to improve supply chain water resilience.
Aramco Ventures' investment, its first in an Indian startup, was motivated by Mitti Labs' focus on methane emission reduction, water resilience, and the application of AI in agriculture for emerging markets. Laguarta noted the potential for collaboration with Aramco Ventures' network and Aramco itself.
With the new funding, Mitti Labs plans to launch operations in the Philippines by the end of the year, followed by expansion into Indonesia and other Southeast Asian markets in 2027. This expansion will enable Mitti Labs to serve compliance carbon markets and adapt its model to diverse farming systems, emphasizing its role as a data company operating across different ecosystems.