Peter Thiel just bet $2 billion on a collar that wraps around a cow’s neck.
The company is called Halter and it has a proprietary algorithm that runs the entire operation.
They actually trademarked the name for it and called it the Cowgorithm and here's how it works.
A farmer opens an app, taps a button, and 600,000 cows across three countries start walking toward the milking station on their own.
No farm dogs, fences or physical labor, it's just a solar-powered GPS collar sending sound and vibration cues to each animal.
The collar does more than move cows around.
It monitors digestion, fertility cycles, and health patterns in real time, 24 hours a day, using machine learning trained on the behavior of hundreds of thousands of animals.
Halter was founded by a rocket engineer who built spacecraft at Rocket Lab before deciding that farming was the bigger unsolved problem.
US ranchers alone have already used the technology to build over 11,000 miles of virtual fencing, roughly the full perimeter of the continental United States, saving an estimated $220 million in physical fencing costs.
Halter's previous funding round valued the company at $1 billion.
This new round, led by Thiel's Founders Fund, doubles that valuation to $2 billion before the new money even hits the account.
And they charge farmers between $5 and $8 per animal per month on a subscription model, meaning the more cows they collar, the more locked-in the revenue becomes.
The most powerful venture capitalist on earth just decided that the future of food and farming runs through an algorithm named after a cow.
$5-8 per cow, per year? I can't see ranchers with 100-300 head of cattle, or more, doing this more than one of two times before deciding it's too expensive. Even with a subscription, they still need to pay for the damned collars, because everyone knows Thiel isn't gonna just give them away to any rancher that wants them. I noticed how the article doesn't mention that little fact. Nor does it mention anything about repair costs, or whether or not they're weather proof. The article doesn't mention what the fail rate is on those things, either, especially when there's significant cloud cover that obscures the satellite signals for the gps transcievers.
The ranchers with less than 50 head herds might, but then, you don't need a lot of land for that many cattle, so using fencing is easier because you can just use binoculars to survey your fencing. Maybe this is one of the reasons why beef prices have gone up so much the last couple of years?
However, cattle ranching isn't rocket science, so I guess they've been able to market it well enough to sucker a bunch of ranchers into this.
Dairy cows already move themselves from pasture into the milking area.
I guess for cattle it might make more sense as it seems a couple bull calves every year get ambitious and escape.
But, TBH, fencing is cheap, it works, and it doesn't require a monthly subscription. And in most rural areas, an escaped cow is an annoyance but hardly a crisis.
Seems like there could be a market for an inexpensive gps tracker, maybe built into the ear tags, but this product seems way overpriced
Why everything has to be technology involved? Leave the poor cows alone, are we going to eat cows with radiation or something like it? Plus I can imagine this is an experiment just to find out if we as humans can put a collar someday to control us. Don’t like it at all. God we need your protection against evil.,
in 4...3...2...1 we switch to BISON. No one has fences and we all eat for FREE. I have studied Ted Turner in his land acquisitions and he was SO FAR AHEAD of the CURVE.....get into the ARK and take a ride.
Ted-Bill excellent adventure
NOPE!!!!!!!!
TED TURNER
BILL GATES
I know sounds silly to you begin to notice oddities between them.
2 men way TOO FAR AHEAD of the curve shows you something. Ted Turner...he did time in Military Academies. If you look at his FARMING practices and I have done a good study on that. He was REVERTING BACK to the way it was ORIGINALLY. Look at the GREAT Farming Pioneer Joel Salatin with the grasses and how we need to restore those.
Turner and Joel are saying the SAME THINGS.
We could EAT for FREE, throw out cows along with PETER THEIL. Bring back BISON. Peter Theil is a MORON and anyone who believes his BS. The men with COWS are SCREWING YOU and charging you for FOOD you could get for FREE/ minus processing fees if you so choose
sounds interesting. I wonder how long until they make it mandatory for humans to be wearing some form of this collar....
I wonder how long until some smarty pants decides how much fun it would be to hack this new technology and sends cows everywhere.
They already do, it is called a cell phone
I don’t really like this development. When other people put controlling collars on living beings, things can only go down hill from there.
Prisons seem the likely staging ground ....under the guise of minimal security.
Reminds me of the movie WEDLOCK with Rutger Hauer.: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0103239/
Collas can be taken off. They'll have injecting for humans.
Cowpoke: "Ain't no AI takin' my job!"
Peter Thiel: "Hold my beer."
😔
Milk Road AI @MilkRoadAI on X:
This is WILD.
Peter Thiel just bet $2 billion on a collar that wraps around a cow’s neck.
The company is called Halter and it has a proprietary algorithm that runs the entire operation.
They actually trademarked the name for it and called it the Cowgorithm and here's how it works.
A farmer opens an app, taps a button, and 600,000 cows across three countries start walking toward the milking station on their own.
No farm dogs, fences or physical labor, it's just a solar-powered GPS collar sending sound and vibration cues to each animal.
The collar does more than move cows around.
It monitors digestion, fertility cycles, and health patterns in real time, 24 hours a day, using machine learning trained on the behavior of hundreds of thousands of animals.
Halter was founded by a rocket engineer who built spacecraft at Rocket Lab before deciding that farming was the bigger unsolved problem.
US ranchers alone have already used the technology to build over 11,000 miles of virtual fencing, roughly the full perimeter of the continental United States, saving an estimated $220 million in physical fencing costs.
Halter's previous funding round valued the company at $1 billion.
This new round, led by Thiel's Founders Fund, doubles that valuation to $2 billion before the new money even hits the account.
And they charge farmers between $5 and $8 per animal per month on a subscription model, meaning the more cows they collar, the more locked-in the revenue becomes.
The most powerful venture capitalist on earth just decided that the future of food and farming runs through an algorithm named after a cow.
He might be right.
$5-8 per cow, per year? I can't see ranchers with 100-300 head of cattle, or more, doing this more than one of two times before deciding it's too expensive. Even with a subscription, they still need to pay for the damned collars, because everyone knows Thiel isn't gonna just give them away to any rancher that wants them. I noticed how the article doesn't mention that little fact. Nor does it mention anything about repair costs, or whether or not they're weather proof. The article doesn't mention what the fail rate is on those things, either, especially when there's significant cloud cover that obscures the satellite signals for the gps transcievers.
The ranchers with less than 50 head herds might, but then, you don't need a lot of land for that many cattle, so using fencing is easier because you can just use binoculars to survey your fencing. Maybe this is one of the reasons why beef prices have gone up so much the last couple of years?
However, cattle ranching isn't rocket science, so I guess they've been able to market it well enough to sucker a bunch of ranchers into this.
especially at $5-8 per cow per month.
Our neighbors have cattle and one has dairy cows.
Dairy cows already move themselves from pasture into the milking area.
I guess for cattle it might make more sense as it seems a couple bull calves every year get ambitious and escape.
But, TBH, fencing is cheap, it works, and it doesn't require a monthly subscription. And in most rural areas, an escaped cow is an annoyance but hardly a crisis.
Seems like there could be a market for an inexpensive gps tracker, maybe built into the ear tags, but this product seems way overpriced
Now they are putting Sheep Dogs out of work.
Cowboys & horses. This is anti-American. I do not consent.
Border Collies are smarter than these collars
They make for good companions on the lonely plains.
Yes they do I sure miss mine
Any way to play this in the public markets? Love those subscription service businesses.
They suck. I miss the days when you can turn on TV and watch without a service provider & subscription.
Why everything has to be technology involved? Leave the poor cows alone, are we going to eat cows with radiation or something like it? Plus I can imagine this is an experiment just to find out if we as humans can put a collar someday to control us. Don’t like it at all. God we need your protection against evil.,
in 4...3...2...1 we switch to BISON. No one has fences and we all eat for FREE. I have studied Ted Turner in his land acquisitions and he was SO FAR AHEAD of the CURVE.....get into the ARK and take a ride.
Ted-Bill excellent adventure
NOPE!!!!!!!!
TED TURNER
BILL GATES
I know sounds silly to you begin to notice oddities between them.
2 men way TOO FAR AHEAD of the curve shows you something. Ted Turner...he did time in Military Academies. If you look at his FARMING practices and I have done a good study on that. He was REVERTING BACK to the way it was ORIGINALLY. Look at the GREAT Farming Pioneer Joel Salatin with the grasses and how we need to restore those.
Turner and Joel are saying the SAME THINGS.
We could EAT for FREE, throw out cows along with PETER THEIL. Bring back BISON. Peter Theil is a MORON and anyone who believes his BS. The men with COWS are SCREWING YOU and charging you for FOOD you could get for FREE/ minus processing fees if you so choose