SMALL ROBOT COMPANY ENTERS LIQUIDATON

The Small Robot Company, UK developer of autonomous agricultural solutions known as 'Tom', 'Dick' and 'Harry', has entered liquidation.

In a statement posted to LinkedIn, the company said, "Unfortunately, we could not come through the valley of death, even with our angels. Sadly, we fell foul through endemic perceived risk around agtech, particularly in the UK. We secured an international investor, but could not close the deal within our runway.

"A heartfelt thanks for all your support in getting this far. Looking back, it really is incredible what we achieved. We were so close to ‘escape velocity’.

"Ultimately, we hit our biggest technical goal, our farmers’ ‘Holy Grail’: grass weed detection at scale."

The statement continued, "It is with great sadness that our journey is ending before we could successfully deliver our mission, and our value to you, who have backed us every step of the way. In the end the perceived risk around agtech robotics for cereal crops was too great to close a VC deal.

"We hope that the liquidation process is able to find a future for the technology which continues to have a benefit to farmers, and the planet."

This week CEO Ben Scott-Robinson, spoke to the BBC's Farming Today about the liquidation and the difficulties in finding investment for agtech in the UK. You can listen to Ben here from 3m 45sec.

Last year the company turned to Crowdfunding following a lead investor pulling out.