Failed AI tractor company lays off all employees..farmer found AI farming to be dangerous

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

https://www.sfgate.com/tech/article/monarch-ai-tractor-failure-22183476.php




A Bay Area startup that set out to revolutionize global farming appears to have collapsed, burning through hundreds of millions of dollars, laying off nearly all of its employees and leaving disappointed farmers across the country.

Monarch Tractor raised over $240 million for its self-driving, electric tractors guided by artificial intelligence that debuted in 2023. That year, Time called the vehicle one of the year’s greatest inventions, and Forbes predicted that the company would become the world’s next billion-dollar startup. The company was later valued at $518 million. Now, the company has abandoned its Livermore headquarters after laying off its entire staff last year and warning it may “shut down.”

California winemaker Patrick O’Connor gave the technology a blunt review in an Instagram video posted this week: “It totally failed.” In the video, he said he’s been testing the tractor for three years on his steeply sloped vineyard and that $200 million in investor and government money had been “wasted” on the “failed autonomous AI robot tractor.” The video went viral, with nearly 550,000 views and just over 24,000 likes as of Wednesday.

O’Connor told SFGATE that, in his three years with the machine, he couldn’t find any serious uses for it. He also said it was dangerous when in self-driving mode.

“I wouldn’t let anyone else around it,” O’Connor said.