Chiratae Ventures Backed CropIn Rolls Out Micro Language Model To Aid Climate Smart Agriculture

Bengaluru-based agritech startup CropIn has launched an open-source micro language model to aid climate smart agriculture. Dubbed ‘aksara’, the new solution is designed to address the problems of farmers in the global south and promote sustainability.

The model empowers anyone in the agriculture ecosystem to build frugal and scalable AI solutions for the sector, the company said in a statement.

Akṣara was built on Mistral’s foundation model and fine-tuned with over 5,000 high-quality question-response pairs, specifically designed for agriculture and over 160K tokens in the context.

The inaugural akṣara model will cover nine crops, including paddy, wheat, maize, sorghum, barley, cotton, sugarcane, soybean and millets for five countries in the Indian subcontinent, which include India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bangladesh. 

As large language models consume massive amounts of energy to train and function, CropIn has decided to compress akṣara from 16 bit to 4 bit.

Incorporated in 2010 by Krishna Kumar and Kunal Prasad, CropIn is a SaaS-based agtech startup which helps farm-to-fork businesses digitise their operations and make informed decisions that enhance farming efficiency, productivity and sustainability.

It claims to have partnered with more than 250 B2B customers, digitised 30 Mn acres of farmlands, benefitting over 7 Mn farmers worldwide. 

Kumar told Inc42 that of the $34 Mn raised in the last two rounds, around 40% of the proceeds were deployed to grow intelligence and build assets for scale.

Kumar also said CropIn would be raising additional capital shortly, without divulging details on the upcoming funding round.

“We will be raising additional capital in the near future to advance these models … and incorporate these in farming operation workflows for actionable decision-making on the field. Our AI goals are strategically designed to supercharge intelligence on every cultivable land and accelerate adoption of digital technologies in agriculture,” Kumar said.

In December 2022, the startup raised $14 Mn funding from a clutch of investors, including Google and JSR Corporation. The round also saw participation from Impact Assets, along with existing investors Chiratae Ventures and JSR Active Innovation Fund.

Prior to that, in 2021, CropIn netted $20 Mn in its Series C funding round led by Singapore-based private equity firm and impact investor ABC World Asia.

Till date, CropIn raised $47 Mn in total funding, a company spokesperson told Inc42. The startup also counts Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Pratithi Investment Trust among its investors.

As per Inc42’s report, India’s agritech market is projected to reach $24 Bn by 2025. The startups operating in the space have been gaining a lot of traction from investors for quite some time now.

For instance, in February, agritech startup Farmtheory raised $1.45 Mn in a seed funding round from Merak Ventures.

In December last year, agritech startup Fasal secured $12 Mn in its Series A funding round co-led by TDK Ventures and British International Investment.

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