Vertical farming is flourishing thanks to digitalization

80 Acres Farms has made supplying fresh food for a growing population its mission. How? With fully automated, indoor vertical farming. As it turns out, controlled environment agriculture is also more sustainable than traditional farming methods.

Who said the plants we eat must be grown outdoors? All over the world, city populations are increasing in size. At the same time, more and more consumers are demanding clean, locally grown food. Metropolitan agricultural efforts seek to combine these trends with controlled environment agriculture.

A leader in this area is 80 Acres Farms, which grows everything from salad, microgreens, and herbs to tomatoes and baby cucumbers. Siemens supports the industrialization and scaling of the company's proprietary Loop platform from 80 Acres Farms’ technology-focused subsidiary Infinite Acres. This comprehensive solution encompasses crop management software, algorithms, environmental controls, robotics, and automation.

A typical vertical farm is stacked high with layers of plants. Picture fields stacked on top of fields lit with LED lighting at each level, efficiently utilizing the vertical space and significantly increasing food production. The conditions in a vertical farm are monitored around the clock to ensure the plants have the perfect amounts of light energy, carbon dioxide, nutrients, air, temperature, and humidity they need.

Ten years ago, this was science fiction. Tomorrow, indoor vertical farming is going to be so ubiquitous that everyone will wonder how we lived without it.

Mike Zelkind, Co-founder and CEO of 80 Acres Farms

Better for the environment

Vertical farming leads to healthier and more sustainable food. For one, everything 80 Acres Farms grows is 100% pesticide-free. Compared to traditional agriculture, 300 times more food can be grown per square foot at an 80 Acres Farms site. And with 17 to 20 more growing cycles annually, output is considerably higher. Because produce is grown close to consumers, there are lower carbon emissions associated with travel. Finally, optimized water and land use lead to less agricultural waste.

Of course, what is good can always become better. 80 Acres Farms and Infinite Acres are committed to employing innovative automation and digitalization technologies to make farms safer and more productive. And to do that, they are partnering with some of the biggest and best in technology – including Siemens. 

A strategic investment in the future of agriculture

At the beginning of 2023, Siemens and 80 Acres Farms officially announced their collaboration to industrialize and scale the proprietary loop system from Infinite Acres. Anchored by an equity investment from Siemens Financial Services (SFS), Siemens and 80 Acres Farms are partnering to apply innovative solutions, such as crop management software and algorithms, environmental controls, robotics, and automation. These are just some of the many concrete technologies Siemens is supplying:

We are providing smart power distribution equipment and building management technologies within the facilities to help monitor fire and life safety, security, and the power distribution systems themselves – all from a single interface. Moreover, Siemens’ suite of advanced industrial automation technologies and edge devices will help automate the production line, while edge devices and human-machine interfaces monitor and update the farms’ control systems.

To take a deeper look into operations, Siemens and 80 Acres Farms are collaborating on a #DigitalTwin that simulates the plant growth and the production process. Thus, it will be possible to predict plant growth under diverse conditions and better coordinate growth cycles with shipping schedules.

The future of vertical farming is all about collaboration – finding the best partners to help scale and industrialize the technology – so that fresh, clean, nutritious food will be accessible to more people around the world.

Tisha Livingston, Co-founder of 80 Acres Farms and CEO of

Infinite Acres

A better yield of tastier and more nutritious plants

The collaboration also extends to research and development. For example, Siemens Technology is leveraging artificial intelligence and machine learning to develop an app that optimizes software for controlling vertical farms. The goal here is twofold: to avoid adverse conditions within the plants that could impair yields, and to determine which conditions lead to better nutrition and flavor.

The capital provided to 80 Acres Farms by SFS makes it possible for the eco-friendly company to unlock growth and fund the future infrastructure and technology required to scale. With financial and technological support from Siemens, 80 Acres Farms will have what it needs to expand the number of vertical farms it operates (soon to be seven). And Infinite Acres will be able to bring its Loop system to even more metropolitan areas. City-dwelling consumers: get ready for nutritious, tasty food grown close to you.