It began with a question.
CropNow started in 2023 with one question: why are so many families giving up farming, and what would it take for farming to work for them again?
The answer had to come from farmers themselves, so that is where the work began.
“We are losing our farmers, our flavors, and our farming soul.”
Mohammed Kabeer
Before building anything, we listened.
For two years the team worked in fields across South India, running case studies in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh and talking with farmers about their crops, costs and losses.
Through our CropChronicles programme, field researchers documented each problem alongside the farmers who faced it. The studies grew to 11+ locations and 300+ farmers in five states, and they shaped everything that followed.
- 11+
- locations
- 300+
- farmers in the studies
- 5
- states
- Karnataka
- Tamil Nadu
- Andhra Pradesh
- Telangana
- Punjab
What farmers told us, again and again.
-
65% of the water lost
“65% of my irrigation water is wasted. I watch it flow away every season.”
-
20% of the yield lost
“The weather keeps changing. I lose 20% of my yield, sometimes more.”
-
30% of the harvest lost
“Pests strike before I notice. 30% of my harvest is gone.”
And overall.
-
30–40% of the crop lost
“Even after harvest, 30–40% of what we grow never reaches the market.”
Farmers’ own estimates, recorded in CropNow’s field case studies, 2023 to 2024. Each is reported, not measured. The first three are single kinds of loss; the last is the overall share of the crop farmers said never reaches the market. Every product we build starts from one of these problems.
What was missing.
- Advice too generic for one field
- Technology priced out of reach, with no support once sold
- Water, pesticide and fertiliser used by guesswork
- Pests and disease found too late
- No automation made for Indian farms, as labour grows scarcer and costlier
Sources: Inc91, “Reviving Farming’s Soul: Mohammed Kabee… · AkashBhumi, About (CropNow's journey) · CropNow, About
Turning insights into technology.
Each problem from the field became a design question. The team prototyped in the lab, tested on working farms and went back to the bench whenever a design fell short.
Field pilots with farmers shaped every version before it moved forward.
Sources: AkashBhumi, About (CropNow's journey) · Inc91, “Reviving Farming’s Soul: Mohammed Kabee…
What we built.
Three products came out of that work, designed to work as one system.
- NEST a solar-powered smart farm monitoring station that records soil, weather and air conditions on the farm.
- SEED an autonomous field rover in development, built for crop inspection and targeted spraying.
- CropDesk the agricultural intelligence platform that turns field data into alerts and advice, in English, हिन्दी, తెలుగు and ಕನ್ನಡ.
NEST stations are deployed on farms in four states and report to CropDesk. SEED is in prototype testing.
Farm data belongs to the people who generate it. CropNow never shares who a farmer is or where their farm is.
Sources: CropNow, About · CropDesk, How it works
Recognition, and what lies ahead.
In December 2025, at the Presidential Hackathon in Taiwan, CropNow and NEST were named one of the two Teams of Excellence in the international track, themed “Digital Innovation for Resilience and Sustainability”.
President Lai Ching-te presented the award in Taipei. The Office of the President described CropNow as a team from India that “helps farmers increase yields by monitoring crop health in real time.”
Recognised at home.
- Pusa Krishi Incubation
- ICAR-IARI, New Delhi, for early-stage climate-smart farm technology.
- Grassroot Innovation Challenge
- Winner, for practical solutions to real farm problems.
- IIC Regional Meet 2025
- Best Innovation Award, AICTE IIC Regional Meet.
- Elevate Karnataka 2025
- Government of Karnataka, for climate-smart farm technology.
- Young Innovator & Entrepreneur of the Year 2025
- REVA University, to Mohammed Kabeer.
Recognised by
Supported by
See all 75 photographs in the gallery
Where we are going.
Our five-year goals, set in 2025. They are targets, not results, and we will report against them as we go.
- 10M+farmers reachedacross India, then Southeast Asia and Africa
- 15Blitres of water savedthrough precision irrigation (projected)
- 95%less chemical usethrough organic spot spraying
- Cleanerrural airby cutting pesticide drift
- 5sustainable brandsmade from upcycled agri-waste and soil-enriching products
Six ventures, one sky.
CropNow is the core of a six-venture ecosystem. Its farm intelligence drives the work of five ventures across design, materials, earth resources, skills and pest control.
- CropNow
- The core: farm intelligence for smart farming
- KabeGrip
- Design and engineering: Kabegrip Design & Engineering Pvt Ltd
- Ivana
- Innovative biomaterials for a sustainable future
- AkashBhumi
- Smarter decisions about Earth’s resources
- DOT
- Design engineering initiative for student skill development
- Kairoman
- Effective agricultural products for pest control
Sources: Office of the President, Taiwan: President Lai … · Ministry of Digital Affairs, Taiwan: 2025 Presi… · 2025 Presidential Hackathon International Track… · CropNow, About · REVA University, on Mohammed Kabeer and the Pre… · Inc91, “Reviving Farming’s Soul: Mohammed Kabee…
Mohammed Kabeer
Founder and CEO
Jaswant Charith Uppalapati
Founder’s Fellow
Irum Fathima
Head PMO and Founder’s Associate, Strategy and Business Operations
Kamsala Mubashira
AI/ML Associate and PMO Support
Mohammad Aman
Director and Head, R&D and Product Engineering
Huzaifa Fathima
Electronics Associate
S Vaishnavi
Head, AI/ML and Digital Systems
Ranjith Kumar Reddy M
AI/ML and Software Development Engineer
Chinduluri Sumant
Software Engineer
Asnawas A
Associate Product and Technology Lead
Pavan H C
AI/ML Engineer and Team Operations Coordinator
