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Phytoform Labs

Category: AI in Agriculture

An agricultural technology company using AI and genome editing to rapidly create new, climate-resilient, and nutritious crop varieties. Phytoform Labs was founded in 2017. The company is led by Dr. William Pelton. Based in Harpenden, UK & Boston, MA, USA. Team size: 11-50. Total funding raised: $5.77M. Latest round: Seed Round. Key investors include Eniac Ventures, Refactor Capital, Fifty Years, Pymwymic, Happiness Capital.

Founded
2017
Headquarters
Harpenden, UK & Boston, MA, USA
Team size
11-50
Total funding
$5.77M

Value proposition

To produce new plant traits in months rather than years at a fraction of the cost of traditional breeding by using a proprietary AI platform to unlock genetic diversity.

Products and solutions

Proprietary AI trait discovery platform (CRE.AI.TIVE™), New tomato varieties with enhanced disease resistance and shelf-life, Potato varieties with improved nutritional content, AI-powered corn trait development with Beck’s Hybrids and RAGT targeting whole-plant architecture, harvestable yield and productivity

Unique value

The use of their proprietary AI platform, CRE.AI.TIVE™, to simulate and predict genetic edits for desired traits, significantly accelerating the R&D process compared to traditional methods.

Target customer

Seed companies, and large-scale growers and food producers.

Industries served

Agriculture, Biotechnology, Food Production

Technology advantage

Their AI-driven platform allows for the rapid, cost-effective redesign of native gene expression without using transgenic methods, enabling faster time-to-market for new crop varieties.

How they differentiate

Phytoform focuses on speed and precision through its AI platform for mainstream vegetable crops, unlike Pairwise's consumer-brand focus or Tropic Biosciences' focus on tropical crops.

Main competitors

Pairwise, Tropic Biosciences, Corteva Agriscience

Key partnerships

Rothamsted Research, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Corteva Agriscience, University of Cambridge, University of Western Australia, Macquarie University, CambridgeHOK, University of Lincoln, Bayer (Golden Ticket / Seed2Grow Incubator), NC State University Plant Sciences Initiative, Beck’s Hybrids, RAGT

Notable customers

Corteva Agriscience

Major milestones

Secured $5.77M in seed funding in 2021, Established a US presence in St. Louis, Initiated field trials for newly developed crop varieties, Selected for ARIA £6M grant for synthetic potato chromosome (Jun 2025), Corteva collaboration on AI-driven disease resistance in corn (Jun 2025), $4M AutoTom grant for greenhouse tomato production (Feb 2026), Won Bayer Golden Ticket to NC State Seed2Grow incubator (Jan 2026), Named 2025 FoodTech 500 finalist (Feb 2026)

Growth metrics

Specific metrics are not public.

Market positioning

An innovator in the ag-biotech space, using AI-driven gene editing to serve seed and food production companies in Europe and North America.

Geographic focus

Europe and North America

Patents and IP

Information not publicly available

About Dr. William Pelton

Dr. William Pelton is a passionate plant scientist who co-founded Phytoform Labs in 2017. He has a Ph.D. in Plant Molecular Biology from Imperial College London and is driven to use crops to make agriculture more sustainable. His work focuses on using AI and genome editing to create new, climate-resilient, and nutritious crop varieties.

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