CANADA: Growing Mushrooms With AI
A startup venture in UW’s Velocity incubator, Mycro Harvest provides new tools to an old practice
In the past, mushroom farmers have relied heavily on manual labour for their farming practices. However, local startup Mycro Harvest has changed the landscape of mushroom farming by using AI in the growing process.
Officially founded in Toronto by Christopher Klich and Justin Cheng, the startup joined the University of Waterloo’s Velocity incubator in mid-2023 to scale its AI-driven gourmet mushroom farms in shipping containers.
“It’s a little bit like speed dating, where entrepreneurs come together, and they try to find a co-founder and find a problem that we are both uniquely suited to solve together, rather than the alternative of someone coming with a problem in mind and trying to make their skill sets fit,” explained Cheng, now the CEO and chief technology officer of the company.