Wednesday, August 20, 2025

August 20, 2025 • Estimated Reading Time: 10 minutes

Wednesday, August 20, 2025 

In today’s digest, wishing for more fishing, an agricultural tech check, and the stats on rats. 📊

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  • Your update on the rats stats: 311 rat complaints have fallen for eight straight months, sanitation crews have cleared more than 15 million pounds of litter from highway shoulders and medians, and residents have already ordered or purchased nearly 900,000 official NYC Bins. 🐀 (Gothamist)

    • The next steps: Increase participation in the city’s container program and get more people to enroll in the city’s education campaign on rodent prevention — aka the “Rat Academy.”

  • The State Department of Environmental Conservation is seeking to reclassify 30 city waterways in an effort to expand areas protected for swimming and fishing. 🎣 (CBS News)

    • Among those on the list: the Gowanus Canal (yes, that Gowanus Canal), one of the city’s most historically polluted waterways — but perhaps not for much longer. (Crain’s New York Business).

  • One place you definitely won’t be able to swim today or tomorrow: the city’s beaches. With Hurricane Erin threatening dangerous rip currents and waves, New York City beaches are closed Wednesday and Thursday. 🛟 (New York Daily News)


In other reading:

  • NYC offices are back. Nothing proves it more than JPMorgan’s $3 billion tower (Wall Street Journal)

  • An evening with the Central Park coyotes (New York Times)

  • Coney Island will host a Pee-wee Herman look-alike contest to celebrate 40 years of his Big Adventure (TimeOut New York)

According to PitchBook’s just-released Q2 2025 Agtech VC Trends report, global agricultural technology investment slowed overall. But there’s a bright spot: precision agriculture is booming. 📈

Startups developing autonomous farm robots, drones, and AI-powered farm management tools raised $580 million across 36 deals in Q2, outpacing traditional ag biotech for the first time since 2017.

🗽Why it matters for NYC: While we’re not home to cornfields, New York is increasingly a hub for climate, food, and AI innovation.

  • NYC-based agtech companies have raised $1.5 billion across 52 deals since 2021, according to PitchBook data.

  • Many precision ag companies rely on data science, robotics, and software talent — areas where NYC excels.

  • Investors are betting on solutions that address immediate global challenges like labor shortages and food security, and New York’s growing AI and robotics ecosystem is well positioned to play a leading role in developing those tools.

Take Adriatic Harvest, for example:

  • The company fuses AI, 3D-printing, sustainability, and regenerative farming to reimagine the future of food and agriculture.

  • The company employs “farmers that live in apartments” and uses machine learning and data analysis to monitor crop health and progress.

Some other key takeaways from PitchBook’s report:

  • “Flight to quality” continues: Fewer startups are getting funded, but those with strong fundamentals are commanding higher valuations. Median pre-money valuations jumped from $15 million in 2024 to $24 million in 2025. 💸

  • AI is driving growth: Investors are prioritizing companies that use automation and machine learning to boost efficiency and resilience. 🤖

  • Consolidation is on the rise: Larger, well-capitalized buyers are acquiring promising startups in areas like drones, imagery analytics, and agribusiness marketplaces. 📊

There are also a few investments, accelerators, and events across New York that work toward advancing agtech:

  • On the funding side, Grow-NY is a business competition that attracts innovative, high-growth food and agtech startups from across the globe. Finalists will pitch their business ideas for a chance to win up to $1 million.

  • NYC AgTech Week brings together innovators, entrepreneurs, and leaders in the agtech sector annually.

“As we continue to face new and shifting challenges, it is more important than ever that all members of the agricultural community continue to work together to innovate, exchange best practices and foster a new generation of leaders. After all, things tend to work better when we work together,” wrote New York State Agriculture Commissioner Richard Ball in Lancaster Farming.

In other reading:

  • America's top venture capital firms (Time)

  • Why the NFL just put AI on its roster (Fast Company)

  • Bluefish AI, an NYC-based AI platform for brand marketing, raised $20 million in Series A funding. NEA led the round and was joined by Salesforce Ventures, Crane Venture Partners, Swift Ventures, and Bloomberg Beta.

  • EliseAI, an NYC-based developer of chatbots for the housing and health-care markets, raised $250 million in Series E funding at a valuation north of $2.2 billion. A16z led, joined by Bessemer Venture Partners, Sapphire Ventures, and Navitas.

  • Garage, an NYC-based marketplace selling equipment commonly used in local governments and public safety, raised $13.5 million in seed funding. The round was led by Infinity Ventures with participation from Y Combinator, Initialized Capital, Benchstrength, Wayfinder Ventures, and FJ Labs.

  • Final call! Fierce Foundry is hosting a five-week Investment Readiness Bootcamp designed to help early-stage female founders prepare for their first institutional raise in the next 6-18 months. Work closely with fundraising experts, financial strategists, brand builders, and active investors to sharpen your pitch, financials, and growth plan. Apply by August 22 here.

  • Final call! Precursor Ventures’ How to Raise a Pre-Seed Bootcamp, for founders new to raising venture capital looking to learn the tools and strategies to navigate a pre-seed fundraising journey. Apply by August 22 here.

  • EY’s Entrepreneurs Access Network, which helps businesses bridge gaps in coaching, connections, curriculum, and capital, empowering them to achieve greater growth through tailored support in these areas. Apply by August 29 here.

  • Yale’s Computer Science Fair on September 19, featuring hundreds of students and tech companies. Companies can apply to attend by August 30 here.

  • Downtown Brooklyn Partnership’s Make It in Brooklyn Climate Tech Pitch Contest, aiming to spotlight and support early-stage companies working on solutions to combat climate change. Apply by September 16 here.

  • The Bridge at Cornell Tech, a new workspace on the Cornell Tech campus, is officially open. Sign up for tour invites, events, and updates here.

  • See NYC is gathering 150 New Yorkers for a three-day summer camp-style experience to share ideas to build a better New York City. Apply here.

  • Company Ventures is hosting AI Review events, a year-long conversation series on the current and future state of AI. Submit your AI-related event for consideration here.

  • Union Square Ventures’ “usvwork” — a casual coworking day once a month for founders and builders in NYC. Apply here.

  • Forum Ventures is accepting pitches to its Forum for Founders program. The firm is investing in 30+ companies over the next three months, offering $100K and admission to its pre-seed accelerator to provide personalized GTM and sales support. Apply here.

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