Scanabull Raises $1.1M to Revolutionize Cattle Weight Estimation with 3D Scanning

New Zealand agritech firm Scanabull has secured NZD $1.1 million in a funding round led by Sprout Agritech, the company announced Monday. The investment will accelerate the development and rollout of its AI-powered cattle weighing technology, aiming to modernize a sector traditionally reliant on visual estimation.

The funding round also included participation from Enterprise Angels and support from Callaghan Innovation’s Deep Tech Incubator program, signaling confidence in Scanabull’s approach to livestock management. Founded in 2024, Scanabull is focused on providing farmers and meat processors with more accurate and frequent weight data without the logistical challenges of conventional weighing methods.

Currently, the beef industry often relies on visual assessments for livestock valuation and management, a practice prone to inaccuracies. Traditional weighing requires moving cattle through yards and onto fixed platforms, a process that is labor-intensive, time-consuming, and can cause stress to the animals. Scanabull’s technology offers an alternative by utilizing the LiDAR sensor found in iPhone Pro models or its dedicated Scanabull Weigh Point camera to generate a 3D model of each animal.

The system’s software then analyzes the 3D model to estimate the animal’s live weight within approximately one second. According to Scanabull, the system processes spatial data at a rate of 30 times per second and currently achieves over 93% accuracy for individual animals, with accuracy improving when assessing groups of cattle. The company’s models have been trained on a dataset of more than 100,000 animal data points.

A key feature of Scanabull’s system is its ability to operate without relying on cloud connectivity. Processing is performed directly on the device, addressing a critical need for farms in areas with limited or unreliable internet access. “Many animals are bought and sold based on visual estimates rather than objective measurements,” said Dan Bull, Scanabull’s co-founder and CEO. “When those estimates are wrong, it can result in significant financial differences for farmers, traders and processors.”

Scanabull offers two primary products: the WeighApp, designed for farmers, stock agents, and veterinarians to scan animals in various settings, and the Weigh Point system, intended for automatic weighing in paddocks to track growth trends over time. The company argues that reducing the need for fixed weighing infrastructure, which can be costly and require specialized facilities, will also minimize stress on the cattle.

Dr. Ursula Haywood, Scanabull’s co-founder and chief commercial officer, emphasized the potential for improved decision-making on farms. “The beef sector is still heavily reliant on estimation and manual processes. By introducing objective measurements that can be captured quickly in the field, One can help farmers manage their animals more effectively and make more informed decisions about when to sell,” she said.

The technology also addresses a data gap experienced by meat processors, who often lack reliable weight information about livestock before they arrive at processing plants. Bull stated that improving weight visibility earlier in the supply chain could lead to greater efficiencies and stronger relationships between farmers and buyers.

Crispin Dye, investment manager at Sprout Agritech, highlighted the potential of Scanabull’s approach to broaden access to objective livestock measurements. “Technologies that bring reliable data into agricultural supply chains have enormous potential. Scanabull’s use of computer vision and on-device AI opens up new possibilities for livestock management and supply chain transparency,” Dye said.

Scanabull has developed a proprietary model architecture to enable the rapid processing of neural networks on edge devices, a technical achievement Bull claims is unique in the livestock application space. “No one is running neural networks at this speed on edge devices for livestock applications. Scanabull has developed our own proprietary architecture and training models to make it possible,” he said.

Looking ahead, Scanabull plans to expand its system’s capabilities beyond live weight estimation to include carcass weight prediction and body condition scoring. “Our ambition is to help bring data-driven decision making into the beef industry from birth through to processing. Once farmers have accurate, real-time data about their animals, everything from farm management to market pricing becomes more efficient,” Haywood said.