Drones Are Helping Farmers Pick Fruit
For thousands of years, agriculture has been the backbone of human civilization, enabling the rise of settled societies and the development of cultures worldwide. Early farmers relied on simple tools to manually cultivate crops and sustain their communities. As civilizations advanced, so too did farming methods. By 6000 BCE, the Sumerians of southern Mesopotamia had developed complex irrigation systems, while evidence of crop rotation dates back to medieval Europe. These are just two early examples of practices that would shape the modern agricultural industry. Today, this ancient art continues to evolve with the aid of emerging technologies. From GPS-guided tractors to genetically improved seeds, technological innovations play a vital role in enhancing the efficiency, productivity, and sustainability of agriculture.
In the early 2000s, agricultural engineers in Japan began experimenting with how drone technology could benefit farming practices. By 2015, these efforts had made agriculture one of the driving forces behind the drone revolution. In 2024, the global agricultural drone industry was valued at approximately $4.98 billion, and it is projected to reach $23.78 billion by 2032. Drones are now used for a wide range of agricultural tasks, including spraying fertilizers and chemicals, monitoring crop health and hydration levels, managing insect and mammal pests, mapping fields, planting seeds, and even herding livestock.
In 2016, just as the agricultural drone industry was beginning to take flight, Yaniv Maor founded Tevel Aerobotics Technologies in Tel Nof, central Israel. Combining his expertise in robotics and AI, Yaniv developed a patented drone system to help address many of the challenges faced by farmers in Israel and around the world. “Ten years ago,” Yaniv said, “I was watching a TV documentary about the labor crisis in agriculture in Israel. In the documentary, they brought these young, healthy 20-year-olds to work the fields. After half a day, all of them left. I was shocked. From a technology perspective, I saw that this is a big problem that needs a big solution.”
That solution is an autonomous station that houses a fleet of drone harvesters. The station moves along rows within a farm field. When it reaches a preprogrammed location, the drones begin their work, taking over tasks that are labor-intensive and increasingly hard to fill with human workers. The drones are tethered to the mobile station, which serves multiple purposes, powering the drones for 24-hour operation and collecting the harvested fruit. The tether keeps each drone within a specified range, preventing entanglements or collisions. Each drone is also designed to minimize any risk of damaging the plants or produce.
As a drone approaches a plant, its onboard AI determines which fruits are ready to be harvested and which need more time to ripen. If a fruit is ready, the drone extends a vacuum arm equipped with a soft suction cup. The cup gently attaches to the fruit, then uses air suction to twist and pick it without bruising.
“The robots are equipped with sensors and cameras,” Yaniv explains. “We collect all the information, do data fusion on the video, then run it through our machine-learning algorithms to calculate what is a fruit, what’s the best trajectory to access it, should we pick the fruit by rotating it clockwise or counterclockwise. There are a lot of decisions that need to be taken. And it’s all done autonomously and in real time.”
Tevel’s fruit-harvesting drones are already being deployed in Israel, the United States, and Italy. In 2025, the company secured $38.5 million in a Series C funding round to expand its global reach to Chile and increase its production capabilities. So far, the drones are being used to harvest apples, nectarines, apricots, pears, peaches, and plums. As agriculture continues to evolve from its ancient roots, innovations like Tevel’s autonomous drones represent the latest chapter in a long history of adapting tools to meet the needs of growing populations. What began with irrigation canals and crop rotation has now advanced to artificial intelligence and robotics, proof that even one of humanity’s oldest practices still has room to grow through innovation.
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