Cooperative Ventures, a venture capital fund formed by North America’s leading agricultural cooperatives, today announced its first investment in Sabanto, a hardware and software company on the forefront of developing autonomous capabilities in tractors. Sabanto, founded in 2018, is deploying fully-autonomous machinery performing row crop field operations throughout the U.S.
“We’re very enthusiastic about the strategic benefits presented by the Sabanto investment,” said Growmark Director of Innovation Heather Thompson. “The labor shortage in ag retail is a very real problem. Autonomy presents an exciting solution, but adopting autonomous equipment creates a new set of challenges for traditional operations. By partnering with Sabanto, Growmark and our FS cooperatives have the advanced opportunity to test and learn the impacts of this cutting-edge technology.”
Sabanto is currently focused on retrofitting 60- to 200-horsepower tractors to operate autonomously. Already, Sabanto has proven its ability to automate a variety of row crop field operations, including planting, tillage, spraying and mowing over thousands of acres throughout the Midwest.
“While many autonomous equipment startups are focused on specialty crops, we believe Sabanto’s focus on row crops presents a tremendous opportunity for farmers and our member owners,” said CHS Director of Innovation and Sustainability Ben Van Straten. “This truly is an evolution of agriculture with the potential to lower equipment and labor costs for farmers and ag retailers by using smaller tractors that are more fuel efficient while further improving sustainability through less soil compaction.”
“Cooperative Ventures’ investment is a testament to the importance of autonomy in the future of row crop agriculture. Given the vast network of customers and acres across Growmark and CHS, the path to autonomous field operations will certainly be accelerated,” remarked Craig Rupp, the CEO of Sabanto.
This first investment by Cooperative Ventures is aligned with the capital fund’s core investment areas, or “Fields of Play,” to maximize the impact of each investment: crop production, supply chain, farm business enablement and sustainability.
About Cooperative Ventures
Cooperative Ventures is a venture capital fund founded in late 2021 as a joint venture between CHS and Growmark, two of the largest farmer-owned agricultural supply cooperatives in North America. The fund focuses on innovative solutions and emerging technologies that positively impact farming. In addition to providing capital, Cooperative Ventures is committed to developing mutually beneficial commercial relationships between startups and farmer-owned cooperative partners. CHS and Growmark leverage their industry expertise and farmgate network to provide valuable operational support and resources to help Cooperative Ventures’ portfolio companies grow and succeed. Cooperative Ventures is comprised of teams based out of Bloomington, Ill., and St. Paul, Minn., with management assistance from Touchdown Ventures. More information is available at cooperativeventuresllc.com.
About Growmark
Growmark is an agricultural cooperative serving almost 400,000 customers across North America, providing agronomy, energy, facility engineering and construction, and logistics products and services, as well as grain marketing and risk management services. Headquartered in Bloomington, Ill., Growmark owns the FS trademark, which is used by its member cooperatives. More information is available at growmark.com.
About CHS
CHS Inc. (www.chsinc.com) creates connections to empower agriculture. As a leading global agribusiness and the largest farmer-owned cooperative in the United States, CHS serves customers in 65 countries. We provide critical crop inputs, market access and risk management services that help farmers feed the world. Our diversified agronomy, grains, foods and energy businesses recorded revenues of $35.5 billion in fiscal year 2025. CHS is committed to reducing our impact on the planet, finding and developing new solutions in agriculture and energy, and investing in ways to build a better future for our owners, customers, employees and communities.
About Sabanto
Headquartered in Chicago, Sabanto’s mission is to accelerate autonomy in agricultural machinery to solve two primary problems: the increasingly acute scarcity of labor in rural areas and ever-increasing capital expenses for modern ag machinery. Sabanto’s core competency revolves around low-cost retrofits of existing agriculture machinery regardless of make or model, along with the development of necessary supporting software to maximize the utility of autonomous technology, thereby increasing producer ROI. Learn more at https://sabantoag.com.
