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XWill Apple-Picking Robots Save Agriculture—Or Ruin Farm Workers?
David Shultz is a freelance writer who lives in Santa Barbara, California. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Outside and Nautilus, among other publications.

As part of its effort to “disrupt” the food industry supply chain, Santa-Monica based automation incubator Wavemaker Labs has added—and revived—a new piece of technology that promises to change the game for apple orchards.
In October, Wavemaker acquired the intellectual property behind agtech startup Abundant Robotics’ autonomous apple-picking technology. Wavemaker is now relaunching the technology under the name Abundant Robots and taking aim at a major segment of the agriculture industry—one that generates around $5 billion annually for American apple farmers, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Hayward, Calif.-based Abundant went under last year, citing difficulties “develop[ing] the market traction necessary to support its business during the pandemic.” Despite that failure, Wavemaker Labs founder and CEO Buck Jordan was convinced that the technology behind Abundant was solid, even if the startup’s execution ultimately failed.
“COVID essentially just killed their harvest season and killed the progress they needed to make in order to get the next round of financing,” Jordan told dot.LA. “[Abundant] kind of had to invent everything from scratch, and they’ve done a really great job. But there’s a lot of [technology] that’s cheaper off the shelf that can be used and swapped in.”
Abundant Robots’ automated apple-picking machine grabs an apple.Courtesy of Wavemaker Labs
Jordan, who is fond of statistics, notes that around 87 million metric tons of apples are produced globally each year—making it “far and away, in terms of tree fruit, the biggest category that there is.” He adds that harvesting labor accounts for roughly two-thirds of the cost that consumers pay for an apple at the grocery store, with farming costs only projected to grow in the coming years.
This is where Wavemaker sees the opportunity for Abundant Robots. The IP it acquired essentially constitutes a vacuum-suction apple-harvesting system that operates in tandem with AI-backed image recognition software. In other words, the robot can eye an apple tree and suck the ripe apples right off the branch.
The delicate nature of the suction technology was a key selling point for Wavemaker. “[With] apples, you’ve got to be really ginger with them,” Jordan said. “If you bruise an apple, the value of that particular apple goes down—and now it’s applesauce instead of being sold in Whole Foods.”
Abundant Robots is now looking to raise $20 million via crowdfunding to improve on its existing prototype. If it hits its goals, the next iteration of the machine should cost under $100,000 to produce and be able to pick an apple every one-to-1.5 seconds. That’s likely quicker than even the fastest human pickers, according to Jordan—and of course, the machine never gets tired.
Abundant’s technology may be good news if you’re an apple grower, but probably not if you’re an apple picker. Aviva Chomsky, a professor at Salem State University in Massachusetts who studies immigration and migrant labor in the U.S., believes that automation will likely exacerbate power imbalances between agricultural workers and their employers.
An aerial view of Abundant Robots’ apple-picking technology.Courtesy of Wavemaker Labs
“In an ideal socio-economic system, technologies could be used for the benefit of the many—but in our agricultural system, technologies are generally used for the benefit of the few and to the detriment of the many,” Chomsky told dot.LA.
While Wavemaker and others in the autonomous agriculture space are positioning their platforms as solutions to an ongoing labor shortage, labor advocates say their technologies could prove disastrous for America’s roughly 2.5 million farm workers and its rural farming communities.
“There is what I perceive to be a very insincere narrative—or perhaps more graciously, an incomplete narrative—about what’s really happening,” according to Erik Nicholson, a consultant and former national vice president of the United Farm Workers labor union. “That, to me, is about as sincere as saying Facebook is about connecting friends and family.”
Like Facebook, Nicholson thinks much of the actual value in technology like Abundant Robots’ machines will come from data collection. As tech companies are able to put more intelligent machinery on farms, they’ll be able to collect data on elements such as soil moisture, crop productivity and temperature.
About 87 million metric tons of apples are produced globally each year.Courtesy of Wavemaker Labs
How tech companies choose to leverage that data remains to be seen. They could provide farmers with insights into how to grow more crops in a more efficient and sustainable manner. Nicholson, however, expects that the trend toward automation will come at a cost to farmers.
“Whoever writes the algorithms and has access to the data has tremendous power,” he said. “Do we want to just hand that over to the VCs in Silicon Valley and say they’re going to make the determinations about what’s growing, how and when?”
Critics agree that there’s no easy solution that simultaneously keeps food prices low, saves growers from going bankrupt and pays farmworkers a living wage. Yet as automotion promises to upend the agriculture industry’s status quo, they argue that farm workers at least deserve a seat at the table as billions in investment capital pour into the industry.
Otherwise, Nicholson said he fears that “we’re going to see an ongoing extraction of wealth into the hands of investors—who largely do not live in [farming communities like] Mabton, Wash. or Delano, Calif.”
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David Shultz is a freelance writer who lives in Santa Barbara, California. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Outside and Nautilus, among other publications.
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Plus Capital Partner Amanda Groves on Celebrity Equity Investments
On this episode of the L.A. Venture podcast, Amanda Groves talks about how PLUS Capital advises celebrity investors and why more high-profile individuals are choosing to invest instead of endorse.
As a partner at PLUS, Groves works with over 70 artists and athletes, helping to guide their investment strategies. PLUS advises their talent roster to combine their financial capital with their social capital and focus on five investment areas: the future of work, future of education, health and wellness, the conscious consumer and sustainability.
“The idea is if we can leverage these people who have incredible audiences—and influence over that audience—in the world of venture capital, you'd be able to help make those businesses move forward faster,” Groves said.
PLUS works to create celebrity partnerships by identifying each client’s passions and finding companies that align with them, Groves said. From there, the venture firm can reach out to prospective partners from its many contacts and can help evaluate businesses that approach its clients. Recently, PLUS paired actress Nina Dobrev with the candy company SmartSweets after she had told them about her love for its snacks.
Celebrity entrepreneurship has shifted quite a bit in recent years, Groves said. While celebrities are paid for endorsements, Groves said investing allows them to gain equity from the growth of companies that benefit from their work.
“Like in movies, for example, where they're earning a residual along the way, they thought, ‘You know, if we're going to partner with these brands and create a tremendous amount of enterprise value, we should be able to capture some of the upside that we're generating, too’,” she said.
Partnering in this way also allows her clients to work with a wider range of brands, including small brands that often can’t afford to spend millions on endorsements. Investing allows high-profile individuals to represent brands they care about, Groves said.
“The last piece of the puzzle was a drive towards authenticity,” Groves said. “A lot of these high-profile artists and athletes are not interested, once they've achieved some sort of level of success, in partnering with brands that they don't personally align with.”
Hear the full episode by clicking on the playhead above, and listen to LA Venture on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
dot.LA Editorial Intern Kristin Snyder contributed to this post.
Rivian Stock Roller Coaster Continues as Amazon Van Delivery Faces Delays
David Shultz is a freelance writer who lives in Santa Barbara, California. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Outside and Nautilus, among other publications.
Rivian’s stock lost 7% yesterday on the back of news that the company could face delays in fulfilling Amazon’s order for a fleet of electric delivery vans due to legal issues with a supplier. The electric vehicle maker is suing Commercial Vehicle Group (CVG) over a pricing dispute related to the seats that the supplier promised, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The legal issue could mean that Amazon may not receive their electric vans on time. The dispute hinges on whether or not Commercial Vehicle Group is allowed to raise the prices of its seats after Rivian made engineering and design changes to the original version. Rivian says the price hike from CVG violates the supply contract. CVG denies the claim.
Regardless, the dispute could hamper Rivian’s ability to deliver electric vans to Amazon on time. The ecommerce/streaming/cloud computing/AI megacorporation controls an 18% stake in Rivian as one of the company’s largest early investors. Amazon has previously said it hopes to buy 100,000 delivery vehicles from Rivian by 2030.
The stock plunge marked another wild turn for the EV manufacturer. Last week, Rivian shares dropped 21% on Monday after Ford, another early investor, announced its intent to sell 8 million shares. The next few days saw even further declines as virtually the entire market saw massive losses, but then Rivian rallied partially on the back of their earnings report on Wednesday, gaining 28% back by Friday. Then came yesterday’s 7% slide. Today the stock is up another 10%.
Hold on tight, who knows where we’re going next.
David Shultz is a freelance writer who lives in Santa Barbara, California. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Outside and Nautilus, among other publications.
Snapchat’s Attempt to Protect Young Users From Third-Party Apps Falls Short
Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
Some Snap Kit platform developers have skirted guidelines meant to make the app safer for children.
A new report from TechCrunch released Tuesday found that some third-party apps that connect to users’ Snap accounts have not been updated according to new guidelines announced in March. The restrictions, which target anonymous messaging and friend-finding apps, are meant to increase child safety. However, the investigation found a number of apps either ignore the new regulations or falsely claim to be integrated with Snapchat.
The Santa Monica-based social media company announced the changes after facing two separate lawsuits related to teen suicide allegedly caused by the app. Over 1,500 developers integrate Snap features like the camera and Bitmojis. Snap originally claimed the update would not affect many apps.
Developers had 30 days to revise their software, but the investigation found that some apps, such as the anonymous Q&A app Sendit, were granted an extension. Others blatantly avoided the changes—the anonymous messaging app HMU, which is now meant for adult users, is still available to users "9+" in the App Store. Certain apps that have been banned from Snap, like Intext, still advertise Snapchat integration.
“First and foremost, we put the privacy and safety of our community first and expect the products built by our developer community to adhere to that standard in addition to bringing fun and positive experiences to people,” Director of Platform Partnerships Alston Cheek told TechCrunch.
The news is a blow to Snap’s recent efforts to cast itself as a responsible social media platform The company recently announced Colleen DeCourcy would take over as the company’s new chief creative officer and CEO Evan Spiegel to recently made a a generous personal donation to graduates of Otis College of Art and Design. The social media company currently faces a lawsuit from a teenager who claims it has not done enough to protect minors from sexual exploitation. In April, 44 attorney generals sent a letter to Snap and TikTok urging the companies to strengthen parental controls.
Lawmakers are considering new policies that would hold social media companies accountable for the content on their platforms. One such bill would require social media companies to share data with independent researchers.
Snapchat recently rolled out augmented reality shopping features and influencer-led original content to grow its younger base of users.
Snap Inc., Snapchat's parent company, is an investor in dot.LA.
Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.