Earlier this year, reports emerged that Alphabet was closing down its agricultural tech robotics spinout, Mineral. The news came amid a cash crunch for Google's parent company. Citing a crowded market and concerns about profits, Mineral shut down operations and pivoted to licensing its technology.
This month, Mineral CEO Elliot Grant republished a leaked memo acknowledging that agriculture giant John Deere had acquired one of the startup's technology suites to enhance its See & Spray crop-application solution.
“The challenge of solving sustainable agriculture remains before us,” Grant wrote in the post, “but it is a relay race, not a sprint.”