From almonds and apples to avocados and blueberries, while many high-value, specialty crops depend on bee pollination to survive and thrive, historically little has been known about the intricate world inside the hive — until now.
BeeHero, a data-driven precision pollination company, seeks to change that by offering growers unprecedented visibility into the size, strength and behavior of their hives.
Founded seven years ago, BeeHero’s technology, innovation and role as an end-to-end precision pollination service provider has increasingly garnered attention in the world of sustainable agriculture.
Earlier this year, BeeHero bested more than 3,000 applicants to nab first place at the 2024 Founders Games annual competition held in Davos, Switzerland, which aims to “identify, endorse and support high-growth companies and their founders who are leading the way to achieve Sustainable Development Goals by creating successful, scalable, sustainable and resilient business ventures.”
More recently, BeeHero made Time and Statista’s list of America’s Top Greentech Companies, which ranks 250 of the country’s top sustainability-focused companies based on positive environmental impact, financial strength and innovation.
“BeeHero is gaining a lot of visibility, not only for technology and innovation, but for rapid growth and scalability,” Ze’ev Barylka, BeeHero’s chief sales and marketing officer, told The Packer. “There are very few companies in the agtech world that are bringing scale — one of the largest challenges for ag technology companies overall.”
Barylka says BeeHero has experienced significant growth with revenue doubling year over year for the fourth consecutive year, proving itself as a force in the green-tech sector — a sector predicted to grow to $9.5 trillion by 2030, according to Time.
A deep dive into the hive
BeeHero offers its technology — a low-cost sensor that consistently monitors and collects data from inside the hive — to beekeepers at no cost. The company currently provides sensors for and monitors some 300,000 hives globally. Its machine-learning and research teams then translate that data into actionable insights or recommendations for the beekeeper.
“We have aggregated an unprecedented amount of data that has allowed us to gain a deep understanding of what is transpiring inside a hive; by doing so, we are able to help beekeepers grow better hives,” Barylka says.
Pollination represents a significant expense for growers, he says, and yet historically there has been little to no visibility into the quality of beehives the grower is getting.
“Pollination can cost hundreds of dollars per acre. It’s a lot of money spent on an area of agriculture that hasn’t been digitized in the way; for example, with water, we know exactly how much growers spend in dollars, but also how many acres are being used for irrigation,” Barylka says.
Beehives are not well understood by growers, he added. And historically growers have paid for a hive with no guarantee of the strength of the hive or its ability to perform in the field.
Through data collection and understanding, BeeHero seeks to provide growers with the strongest bees or hives available, allowing growers to both save money and get better results, Barylka says.
BeeHero says beekeepers using its technology have reported 33% fewer colony losses compared to the U.S. national average. Additionally, its analysis suggests a potential 30% increase in crop yields and improved bee health.
“Precision pollination and precision agriculture are at the heart of the impact we have, which is ultimately what sustainable farming is all about — not over-deploying and not over-investing,” he says.
BeeHero becomes the provider of these “smart hives,” Barylka says. “We contract with beekeepers to give them the technology — at no charge — and serve as the provider of precision pollination services to growers. Through our services, we’re basically able to develop a new language of precision pollination, educating growers that what matters is not the quantity of hives, but rather the quality of hives.”
Building a stronger hive
For those who’ve never seen the inside of a hive, Barylka explains that hives contain wooden frames in which bees are grown. The traditional method of grading of hives examines the number of frames inside the hive, he says. Barylka says BeeHero provides a higher concentration of these frames per box, essentially guaranteeing stronger hives with more bees per box.
Through data collection, BeeHero identifies the strongest, most resilient and powerful hives, thereby offering growers a better return on their investment, Barylka says.
“The grower ends up paying the same or less per box, but they are getting much more,” he adds.
Which specialty crops benefit most?
“The No. 1 crop relying on precision pollination is almonds,” Barylka says. “Almonds are king in pollination.”
Other specialty, high-value crops that benefit from healthy hives include avocados, apples and blueberries, he says.
But a strong hive is no guarantee of farming success, Barylka says.
“You still need to monitor what’s happening in the field. So, we have developed a second technology that allows for a better understanding of where bees are going to go in the field by monitoring their flying patterns,” he says.
Bees have their own desires and preferences, he says. A grower may place a hive in a blueberry field, but the bees may go somewhere else to pollinate. BeeHero helps growers to understand why that’s happening with its in-field Pollination Insight Platform — Where should you place your hives to gain better pollination efficiencies? What else is going on in your field that may not help the bees to get where they need to go?
“The hive is just the beginning of the story,” Barylka says. “BeeHero moves into the field to understand the contributing factors that are enabling bee traffic and pollination success and the factors that are working against us.”
Related: How technology can help protect bees and aid beekeepers
A ‘glocal’ company
BeeHero is a global company with sales operations in the U.S. and Australia, as well as research and development operations in Israel. In February, the company launched three Pollination Research Stations in California’s Central Valley to provide users the ability to track and monitor bloom progress and bee activity.
Growers around the world are looking for answers when it comes to bee hives and pollination behavior, says Barylka. “In some ways their needs are very similar, and in other ways they’re specific to their location — that’s where BeeHero, by partnering locally, can develop the best strategies for growers around the world.
“I like to call it ‘glocal’ operations,” he continues. “We are global in our research that speaks to the beehive, which is the common denominator. But you really need to get local as well to understand the dynamics of crop management, labor intensity and the factors that are helping or deterring hives from doing their work. In this way, we utilize our global assets to maximize our value to growers in each local market.”
BeeHero says its California-based research stations explore factors from weather to wind to temperature to competing foraging opportunities in the field to better understand bee behavior.
Through its mapping app, BeeHero can then provide recommendations to optimize the entire process from bee health to hive placement to ensure pollination takes place efficiently and successfully, Barylka says.
“Even though BeeHero started as a technology company, we are equally a service provider. We are the logistical arm for beekeepers, whether we are deploying
two hives in an acre or 2,000 hives to a large farm,” Barylka says. “We’re the end-to-end service provider for precision pollination.”
