Agritech Startup Waycool Foods Acquires IP of GramworkX

WayCool Foods, an agritech firm, has acquired GramworkX's IP and plans to invest $1 million in the company this year and another $1 million in the coming years. Waycool Foods co-founder and CEO Karthik Jayaraman told during the Food For Future Summit at Expo 2020 Dubai that the integration of the GramworkX platform with WayCool will take three to six months. 

GramworkX is a cloud-based smart farm resource management tool that assists farmers in guiding, optimising, and monitoring water usage. It quantifies and analyses water consumption trends in various fields and soil types, as well as providing data assistance. 

"We currently have a farm management tool that we use to deliver insights to farmers based on data from the India Meteorological Department (IMD) and other organisations," Jayaraman explained. "However, the GramworkX platform would enable more precise prediction and analysis." 

He went on to say that this is especially beneficial for high-value crops like pomegranate. 

"Based on the geographical region and soil type, we supply crop-specific data and solutions." "We also have an image-based disease detection feature," said GramworkX co-founder KA Gopalakrishnan. 

WayCool also plans to provide its tech stack as a Software as a Service (SaaS)-based solution that will provide an end-to-end solution for businesses or solve specific needs, such as farm management, shop floor management, logistics management, a B2B platform, or a B2C service. 

"We designed our technology around these concerns," Jayaraman stated. "Within the next six months, we plan to provide them as SaaS solutions to other participants to aid in the resolution of various difficulties that these businesses may face." 

WayCool recently closed on a $7.5 million investment in SV Agri (SiddhiVinayak Agri Processing), a fully integrated potato supply chain player. 

LightRock, LightBox, FMO, Lightsmith, World Bank Group's IFC, Redwood Equity Partners, and Gawa Capital participated in a $117 million Series D investment led by current and new investors, including LightRock, LightBox, FMO, Lightsmith, World Bank Group's IFC, Redwood Equity Partners, and Gawa Capital. 

Waycool Foods has earlier stated that it expects to post a top line of Rs 1,000 crore this fiscal year.