Agricultural Innovation: Fueling the Farm Tech Revolution

On this episode of The Shift Code, PMI CEO Pierre Le Manh sits down with co-founder and CEO of UrbanKisaan, Vihari Kanukollu, to talk about the role his company plays in transforming one of the world’s oldest human activities—food farming. Learn about how UrbanKisaan’s technology boosts the efficiency, quality, and affordability of food farming, how Vihari’s remarkable company is working to expand its impact, and more.

Transcript

Vihari Kanukollu  

This enables us to solve global problems in a very fast and efficient manner. Our goal is, one, how fast can we breed seeds that can solve real-world problems for farmers? And second is, how fast can we deploy infrastructure that is enabling people to grow produce more efficiently?  

I could lease a Tesla for $299 today—that’s how barriers to new technology are reduced. We’re starting a leasing model for $1,000 a month. It’s as simple as you buying an iPhone. 

Pierre Le Manh 

That is the voice of Vihari Kanukollu. He’s the co-founder and CEO of UrbanKisaan. UrbanKisaan is a breakthrough agtech pioneer based in India with clients across the globe, from the Bahamas to Oman to Australia.   

I am Pierre Le Manh, CEO of the Project Management Institute (PMI). Welcome to The Shift Code, a podcast dedicated to the intersection of leadership, change management and real-world impact. 

In this episode, I talk with Vihari about transforming one of the oldest human activities: the farming of food. As Vihari explains, UrbanKisaan deploys technology that dramatically increases farming efficiency, improves food quality and also lowers cost.  

It’s a magical combination with the potential for significant impact. So, let’s get to it. 

This is The Shift Code. 

MUSICAL TRANSITION 

Pierre Le Manh 

Welcome to The Shift Code. I am Pierre Le Manh, the CEO of PMI, and today I’m speaking with Vihari Kanukollu. He’s the co-founder and CEO of UrbanKisaan, which is a leader in hydroponic farming. So, Vihari, thank you so much for joining us. 

Vihari Kanukollu  

It’s a pleasure to be here.  

 Pierre Le Manh 

I’d like to start with trying to understand a little bit what is hydroponic farming. Could you explain what it is and why it is so transformative?  

Vihari Kanukollu 

Hydroponics means soilless farming: the ability to control the nutrients the plant gets, the ability to mimic the environmental conditions for the plant. Data represents that it uses anywhere between 95 to 99% less water than traditional farming. This is because of the self-circulating water system and irrigation system that hydroponics uses.    

Pierre Le Manh  

That’s awesome. And I’m sure that many of us would have some questions about food safety.  

Vihari Kanukollu 

Produce that is grown in hydroponics is mostly grown in a controlled environment. That means that it is by far the safest way to grow produce. If somebody is eating hydroponic produce, they can be rest assured that it is free from any heavy metals. It is free from pesticides, and it is far more nutritious than traditional farming. 

Pierre Le Manh 

Talk a little bit about your company itself, UrbanKisaan. So, I think you began with home kits so people could do this at home, and then you expanded into infrastructure, monitoring systems, seed innovation. How would you define your company today? Is it an infrastructure company, a technology company, a bioengineering company?    

Vihari Kanukollu 

We are a full stack agtech company that works from seed to harvest. But that’s not how we started. We started as a company that was trying to promote home gardening. It came out of the concern that the produce that we eat is not clean, and it comes from a long supply chain, and it’s not fresh enough. We thought, how could we solve this problem and enable people to grow it in their own house? And that’s how we started the company in 2018.  

Fast-forward [to] 2020, with all the piece of profits that we’ve generated from selling these home kits, we’ve built a fairly mid-sized farm in the city that we live in called Hyderabad in India. That enabled people to come to our farm and then buy the produce that we were growing. So, we instantly knew that people were craving for fresh, high-quality produce grown locally. And today, we are enabling farmers, governments and large-scale entrepreneurs to build farms like how we’ve built in India across the world.   

Pierre Le Manh 

And how large is your farm?  

Vihari Kanukollu 

In India, about 30 acres of farms—12 to 13 hectares. 

Pierre Le Manh 

But it’s vertical? 

Vihari Kanukollu 

Some of them are vertically stacked, some of them are not. We are not specifically saying, “Hey, we need to grow vertically,” or “We need to do a greenhouse.” The methodology depends on what crop we are growing. The idea is, how do we grow the most sustainable way and in such an efficient manner that we don’t have to charge a premium to the end consumers who are buying the produce?   

Pierre Le Manh 

So, let’s talk a little bit about sustainability. How much of your work is driven by solving the global food and water scarcity issues?  

Vihari Kanukollu 

Yeah. We have a farm that’s being built in the Bahamas. Today, the Bahamas imports more than 90% of the produce from United States. If the local Bahamians are enabled to grow produce locally, that reduces significant carbon footprint on the produce that they have been consuming.  

And also, they get the produce at a 10th of the cost versus what they’re currently paying. We are looking at sustainability in different angles, not just water that we save, but also how much carbon footprint are we reducing by localizing farms, and how can we use materials that go into farm construction that is recycled? Every single aspect in our company is looking toward growing and building farms sustainably.  

Pierre Le Manh 

And you think it is scalable enough? 

Vihari Kanukollu 

Well, absolutely. We’ve been scaling and fortunate enough that we have partners in close to about 15 countries today. Our systems are built to scale.  

Pierre Le Manh  

Your website highlights something called “speed breeding.” 

Vihari Kanukollu 

Yeah. A seed company, if it has to come up with a new variety of seeds—let’s say, for example, a seed that is drought resistant, or resistant to a virus, or something that is higher yielding—the research generally takes about eight to 10 years. And it’s a very long and capital-intensive process. With multiple combinations of technology that we’ve developed in-house, we’ve been able to speed this [up] to between two to three years, for us to release new seed varieties in a much faster pace than anybody else. So, this enables us to solve global problems in a very fast and efficient manner. Part of it is powered by AI, and part of it is powered by a lot of data models that we’ve built in-house—seeds that have higher resilience to climate change, higher resilience to pests, solves long-term problems. 

Pierre Le Manh 

Are they genetically modified?   

Vihari Kanukollu 

No. It’s this traditional breeding process that has been sped up. We do a bit of gene editing at some points, but we don’t do gene modifications.  

Pierre Le Manh 

Is it a regulated area? 

Vihari Kanukollu 

In some countries, gene editing is permitted. We only use that as the last resort. Our goal is to increase traditional breeding.   

Pierre Le Manh 

As someone who has, as far as I know, no bioengineering background, how did you end up venturing into seed development? 

Vihari Kanukollu 

I keep asking that question myself sometimes. I spent close to five years of my career before this in fintech. My co-founder, Dr. Sairam Reddy, he is a PhD in Indian Institute of Science, postdoc from U.S., spent close to two decades working with farmers in releasing new seed varieties. He was growing plants without soil. So that was magic to me.  

Pierre Le Manh 

You mentioned you are working in the Bahamas. I’m assuming you have private sector clients, governments. Can you explain a little bit whom you sell to? 

Vihari Kanukollu 

We primarily categorize our customers into three: one is government, who are trying to solve for food security; second is large retail and restaurants or hotels, who want to backward integrate their existing supply chain so that they can drive up profits; and third is existing farmers who are doing large-scale agriculture. They experience the impact of climate change on a day in, day out basis. We don’t know any government or sorts of prior players outside of India, so we sign up distributors who share our passion and vision. They have the local connections that allows us to scale very rapidly in the countries that we are in. 

 Pierre Le Manh  

And do you feel you give up too much in terms of control of your own channels? 

Vihari Kanukollu 

No, that’s absolutely fine. The fastest way to work is to work with partners and investors who believe in the vision that we share. Our goal is to achieve food security for every country as fast as possible.  

Pierre Le Manh 

That’s awesome. And so as you are still a startup—I would assume. Are you still considering yourself as a startup? 

Vihari Kanukollu 

Yes. The definition of startup is, for us at least, the ability to move fast to what market wants, all right? I’ve been to Australia, and farmers have been struggling to combat with a virus for tomatoes. Last year, they’ve lost millions of dollars because the crop had been affected from the virus. With our speed breeding approach, we’ll be able to come to a solution for it at a much faster pace. So our goal is two things. One, how fast can we breed seeds that can solve real-world problems for farmers? And second is, how fast can we deploy infrastructure that is enabling people to grow produce more efficiently? 

MUSICAL TRANSITION 

Pierre Le Manh 

Vihari looks at farming from a whole new perspective, which is an essential starting point for any transformation. So how is he expanding the scope of that transformation? We’ll talk about that after the break. Stay with us.   

I am Pierre Le Mahn, and this is The Shift Code. Before the break, we heard UrbanKisaan CEO Vihari Kanukollu talk about the efficiency and sustainability of hydroponic farming.  

Now we dig into how the company is working to expand impact, including by borrowing a strategy from Tesla. Plus, why succeeding with change is both a marathon and a sprint. Let’s get back to it. 

MUSICAL TRANSITION 

Pierre Le Manh  

Transformation is a theme of this podcast, and your business is definitely very transformative. What kind of resistances are you facing?  

Vihari Kanukollu  

Honestly, the industry that we are in, people want this change. If for a farmer, I’m saying, “Hey, you are going to get three times higher yield. You’ll make more money,” there won’t be resistance.   

Next year is going to be big for us. We are going to commercialize some of the seed varieties that we’ve developed in-house and also incrementally grow our infrastructure deployments.   

Pierre Le Manh 

Another transformation that I’m really interested in understanding, that you’ve shifted to leasing systems. That sounds like a bold move. So what drove this change, and how does it work for you? 

Vihari Kanukollu 

I honestly was very inspired by Tesla. I could lease a Tesla for $299 today, right? That’s how barriers to new technology are reduced. It used to take millions of dollars to build hydroponic vertical farms globally. We’re starting a leasing model for $1,000 a month. So that just drops the risk barrier for end consumers. Imagine you’re a retailer or a restaurant owner—you don’t have to spend millions of dollars. It’s as simple as you buying an iPhone, and you’ve solved a lot.   

Pierre Le Manh 

That makes your business very capital intensive, right?    

Vihari Kanukollu 

Our own capital deployment is so low because of the technology that we built. Our money gets paid back in less than 12 months.   

Pierre Le Manh 

That’s unbelievable. When is the next time you’re raising money?   

Vihari Kanukollu 

We are fortunate that we’ve been profitable for the last two years. I’m hoping not to fundraise sometime soon.     

Pierre Le Manh  

What are the markets that are the most important for you going forward?   

Vihari Kanukollu 

We primarily focused on India, but however, we have allied markets like the Caribbean and the Middle East and Australia. These essentially are the markets. Some of them, over the next one year, would just be in pilot phase, and some of them would be in large-scale deployments.   

Pierre Le Manh  

You mentioned in the case of the Bahamas that they’re importing a lot of their produce from the U.S. So that’s very expensive for them. But are there any criteria or parameters that make a market particularly attractive for you?   

Vihari Kanukollu  

The way we look at a market is not whether the market needs hydroponics or vertical farms, because the end consumer in that market who buys produce from a retail shelf really doesn’t care how you’ve grown the produce. But he would care if the produce is 50% discounted, right? So the markets that we look at is, where is the price delta that we can create between what is prevailing in the market? And if we bring in our technology into that country, how much can we drop this price of the produce? Is it 10%, 20%, 30%? So higher the delta, the higher the probability of success for us.   

Pierre Le Manh  

Can we talk a little bit about the lessons and changes you have drawn from your experience so far?    

Vihari Kanukollu  

I myself have been on quite a learning journey in the last five years because we don’t come from a business background. We learn every day. One thing that I believe every leader should be open to is change from their own existing plans. Because you start your business with a vision and then suddenly market hits you with reality. “We don’t need your problem statement. We don’t need your solution.” If you’re a leader, if you are very stuck to your own idea, it creates a problem. You’ll never move forward. If we were stuck with home kits, we would have not invented speed breeding.    

Pierre Le Manh 

And that happened because you started to try and step back and look at the problem you are actually trying to address, as opposed to the solution that you had come up with?   

Vihari Kanukollu  

Exactly. You shouldn’t push the solution you have if the user doesn’t want it. It’s the reverse. You have to spend at least six months talking to consumers rather than, “Oh, I believe this is a brilliant idea. How many people will buy this?” So it should be the reverse. One million people are facing this problem, and we should solve for this. It’s a completely different approach.    

Pierre Le Manh  

So your system, if I hear you, I feel like the results must be incredible. But still, adoption has been probably not as fast as you wanted. So how do you maintain optimism? What is the level of resilience that is needed when progress feels delayed?  

 Vihari Kanukollu  

Yeah, it’s a very good question. The journey is a mix of a marathon and a sprint. While we have the best of the best technology today, we still need a couple of more years to actually show impact. The pivots in our journey from, let’s say, selling home kits to building our own farms, to selling produce, and then realizing, “Oh, we’ve had this technology. I think now we should start deploying this technology.” It’s just [such a] time-consuming process. If you don’t have 10 years of your life dedicated to building the vision, do not start a startup because it’s pointless. Unless you’re very passionate, don’t do it.    

Pierre Le Manh 

How do you convey the same passion and patience and long-term focus to your teams?   

Vihari Kanukollu   

We try to show the impact that we want to create. It’s so fortunate that the company that we are trying to build impacts millions of people. So, people stay along for the joy of it, and people stay along to see that impact when they joined three years ago.   

Pierre Le Manh  

Do you sometimes lose faith yourself? Have moments where you feel it’s not going to work, or I’m not the right person to lead this organization? Does it happen to you?   

Vihari Kanukollu 

Absolutely. It’s part of the whole journey: 90%, you always lose faith. It’s not even 50-50. Ninety percent, you always lose faith, and 10% [you see] glimmers of hope. And that’s what drives you to wake up the next day and then go back to work again. If you’re truly not passionate, then you will lose, midway. Most of the startups fail because they don’t expect it to move as fast as what they’re picturing in their brain.    

Pierre Le Manh  

Thank you, Vihari, for sharing your incredible journey, your insights, your wisdom, your long-term thinking, your passion. It’s been a fascinating conversation about innovation, leadership and the future of sustainable agriculture. I really believe your work is an inspiration to anyone striving for meaningful change. Thank you, Vihari. 

Vihari Kanukollu 

Thank you so much.  

MUSICAL TRANSITION   

Pierre Le Manh 

Listening to Vihari, it is hard to understand why hydroponic farming isn’t everywhere. But as he acknowledges, change can be hard for us to accept. There’s cultural resistance and economic resistance. That’s why he calls his journey both a marathon and a sprint. We need to sprint to break through entrenched attitudes, but we also need patience.   

Transformation is a bit like trying a new food. At first, it may taste unusual. But the more we try it, the more we grow to enjoy it. And before we know it, it’s a steady part of our diet.   

I am Pierre Le Manh. Thanks for listening.