Calloway reports today too Stoney.
Remember, they own DS's big competitor.
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Anyway, keeping with our golf theme here, here's your chance Stoney, you were wondering how Josh Brown got the good deal on Klarna. Sign up for notification of the next round.
This thing merits more DD of course before any money is thrown their way. I find it hard to believe that someone like Toro or Deere isn't working on something like this. Or some Japanese company. Do you know how many golf courses are in Japan Stoney!?
More than there are Honda's.
First mover advantage maybe?
I wonder if Deere has a secret Skunk-Works though.
Area 43. Outside Moline.
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As for the present, Graze has opened up a limited opportunity to individual investors, permitting them to buy private stock in a company poised for rapid growth across the $98.7 billion commercial landscaping market as well as the $14.16 billion golfing market. Last time Graze offered company stock for sale, it quickly sold out $3.88 million in shares. More than 3,300 investors have already bought up 50 percent of this round’s offerings—and the number of available shares is shrinking every day as the round close approaches on June 30.
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Although the commercial landscaping industry represents one of America’s largest economic sectors, it’s attracted remarkably little innovation from the tech community. Even as electric cars traverse our highways and self-driving vacuums clean our houses, landscaping companies remain dependent on the clunky machinery of our grandparents’ generation.
For example, today’s riding mowers run on absurdly outdated diesel engines, which generate carbon emissions at a staggering 34 times the rate of an average car motor. Even small push mowers require expensive fuel, cutting into landscapers’ margins while pumping pollutants into the atmosphere. In fact, a lack of environmental regulation has allowed commercial landscaping to become a massive (yet rarely noticed) source of industrial pollution across the country.
The costs of this obsolete machinery aren’t only environmental. Mowers require manual operators, whose labor fees consume up to 45 percent of landscapers’ gross revenue. And while mowing is one of the lowest-margin services a landscaper can offer, it remains the industry’s bread and butter, forcing even the nation’s top-ranked landscaping companies to scrape by on margins of 10 percent or less.
These challenges can literally mean life or death for a landscaping company. Even in 2019, before the start of the pandemic, a full 13 percent of commercial landscapers said they’d failed to turn any profit at all. Many others reported decreases in revenue, citing rising wages, labor shortages and high employee turnover as key sources of concern. Landscape industry analysts project an even tighter profit and labor squeeze throughout the remainder of 2021 — which means new solutions are in higher demand than ever.
In short, the only way forward to a sustainable future is to replace yesteryear’s manual mowers with equipment that requires less manual supervision and produces a much lower carbon footprint. Until now, however, landscapers had no alternative to the costly, dangerous, high-polluting machinery they’ve always used. That’s why Graze is on a mission to bring the landscaping industry out of the past, and into the 21st century.
The mower that can save landscaping
Graze’s safe, autonomous electric mowers solve many of the landscaping industry’s long-standing problems at a single stroke. These mowers require very little human input, and no manual labor at all. They present essentially zero risk of injury, as they intelligently stop operations when people and other living things are detected. And unlike conventional mowers, Graze’s machines run on electricity — eliminating high fuel costs while producing zero emissions, and bringing the industry one crucial step closer to carbon neutrality.
On the software side, Graze’s proprietary control panel is easy to operate from a computer, a tablet, or even a smartphone. Once activated, the mower’s AI-powered system automatically goes to work — mapping the boundaries of the area to be mowed, then tracing its interior back-and-forth in a series of parallel paths, detecting obstacles, navigating around them, and committing them to memory. After a few passes, the self-driving mower can perform a precise and consistent job every time, at the push of a single button.
Since a Graze mower can replace two to three human operators, it can reduce a landscaping company’s manual labor costs by as much as 50 percent. What’s more, Graze’s electrical power system eliminates 75 percent of fuel costs. Taken together, these cost savings can create significant breathing room in a landscaper’s profit margin — which, in today’s economic climate, may spell the difference between profitability and bankruptcy for many companies.
In light of these benefits, it’s no surprise that Graze has already raised more than $5.5 million in capital from 4,000 investors, including $500-million VC giant Wavemaker Partners. The company’s leadership team is equally noteworthy. CEO John Vlay, a 35-year veteran of the landscaping business, supervised construction of the California Academy of Sciences’ green roof in Golden Gate Park. CTO Nick Degnan, meanwhile, is the founder of event-technology innovator Unlimit Solutions, and also serves as a board member at Miso Robotics, another successful AI startup.
Led by these game-changing founders, along with a rock-solid engineering and advisory team, Graze has already locked down a lucrative series of commercial contracts — including a total of 215 mowers pre-ordered by industry leaders Mainscape and Miranda’s Landscape, as well as Sundale Country Club.
Remember, they own DS's big competitor.
----------------------------------------------------------
Anyway, keeping with our golf theme here, here's your chance Stoney, you were wondering how Josh Brown got the good deal on Klarna. Sign up for notification of the next round.
This thing merits more DD of course before any money is thrown their way. I find it hard to believe that someone like Toro or Deere isn't working on something like this. Or some Japanese company. Do you know how many golf courses are in Japan Stoney!?
More than there are Honda's.
First mover advantage maybe?
I wonder if Deere has a secret Skunk-Works though.
Area 43. Outside Moline.
------------------------------------------------------------
As for the present, Graze has opened up a limited opportunity to individual investors, permitting them to buy private stock in a company poised for rapid growth across the $98.7 billion commercial landscaping market as well as the $14.16 billion golfing market. Last time Graze offered company stock for sale, it quickly sold out $3.88 million in shares. More than 3,300 investors have already bought up 50 percent of this round’s offerings—and the number of available shares is shrinking every day as the round close approaches on June 30.
=============================
Although the commercial landscaping industry represents one of America’s largest economic sectors, it’s attracted remarkably little innovation from the tech community. Even as electric cars traverse our highways and self-driving vacuums clean our houses, landscaping companies remain dependent on the clunky machinery of our grandparents’ generation.
For example, today’s riding mowers run on absurdly outdated diesel engines, which generate carbon emissions at a staggering 34 times the rate of an average car motor. Even small push mowers require expensive fuel, cutting into landscapers’ margins while pumping pollutants into the atmosphere. In fact, a lack of environmental regulation has allowed commercial landscaping to become a massive (yet rarely noticed) source of industrial pollution across the country.
The costs of this obsolete machinery aren’t only environmental. Mowers require manual operators, whose labor fees consume up to 45 percent of landscapers’ gross revenue. And while mowing is one of the lowest-margin services a landscaper can offer, it remains the industry’s bread and butter, forcing even the nation’s top-ranked landscaping companies to scrape by on margins of 10 percent or less.
These challenges can literally mean life or death for a landscaping company. Even in 2019, before the start of the pandemic, a full 13 percent of commercial landscapers said they’d failed to turn any profit at all. Many others reported decreases in revenue, citing rising wages, labor shortages and high employee turnover as key sources of concern. Landscape industry analysts project an even tighter profit and labor squeeze throughout the remainder of 2021 — which means new solutions are in higher demand than ever.
In short, the only way forward to a sustainable future is to replace yesteryear’s manual mowers with equipment that requires less manual supervision and produces a much lower carbon footprint. Until now, however, landscapers had no alternative to the costly, dangerous, high-polluting machinery they’ve always used. That’s why Graze is on a mission to bring the landscaping industry out of the past, and into the 21st century.
The mower that can save landscaping
Graze’s safe, autonomous electric mowers solve many of the landscaping industry’s long-standing problems at a single stroke. These mowers require very little human input, and no manual labor at all. They present essentially zero risk of injury, as they intelligently stop operations when people and other living things are detected. And unlike conventional mowers, Graze’s machines run on electricity — eliminating high fuel costs while producing zero emissions, and bringing the industry one crucial step closer to carbon neutrality.
On the software side, Graze’s proprietary control panel is easy to operate from a computer, a tablet, or even a smartphone. Once activated, the mower’s AI-powered system automatically goes to work — mapping the boundaries of the area to be mowed, then tracing its interior back-and-forth in a series of parallel paths, detecting obstacles, navigating around them, and committing them to memory. After a few passes, the self-driving mower can perform a precise and consistent job every time, at the push of a single button.
Since a Graze mower can replace two to three human operators, it can reduce a landscaping company’s manual labor costs by as much as 50 percent. What’s more, Graze’s electrical power system eliminates 75 percent of fuel costs. Taken together, these cost savings can create significant breathing room in a landscaper’s profit margin — which, in today’s economic climate, may spell the difference between profitability and bankruptcy for many companies.
In light of these benefits, it’s no surprise that Graze has already raised more than $5.5 million in capital from 4,000 investors, including $500-million VC giant Wavemaker Partners. The company’s leadership team is equally noteworthy. CEO John Vlay, a 35-year veteran of the landscaping business, supervised construction of the California Academy of Sciences’ green roof in Golden Gate Park. CTO Nick Degnan, meanwhile, is the founder of event-technology innovator Unlimit Solutions, and also serves as a board member at Miso Robotics, another successful AI startup.
Led by these game-changing founders, along with a rock-solid engineering and advisory team, Graze has already locked down a lucrative series of commercial contracts — including a total of 215 mowers pre-ordered by industry leaders Mainscape and Miranda’s Landscape, as well as Sundale Country Club.
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