07/30/2026
Join us in congratulating the recipients of the third round of the Bluegrass AgTech Development Corp Challenge Grant!
Launched in 2024, the Challenge Grant program aims to attract and grow ag-tech and food-based businesses in Lexington and across the Commonwealth of Kentucky. The first two funding rounds, announced in August 2024 and September 2025, awarded a combined $925,000 to 10 companies. That funding has helped generate more than $12 million in follow-on investments in those companies, which support 72 jobs and have facilitated nearly 100 farm engagements.
This year, the program received applications from more than 30 companies. Following a competitive review process, six were selected to receive a combined $550,000 in grant funding.
Meet the 2026 Challenge Grant recipients:
FarmSense is commercializing an affordable soil-moisture sensor developed in collaboration with Kentucky farmers. In field testing, the sensor led to improved crop quality and a 40–48% reduction in water use. At FarmSense, the Challenge Grant funds will support Kentucky-based manufacturing and optimization of the sensor's calibration, as well as the initiation of a 15- to 20-farm pilot program ahead of its commercial launch.
Lepidext is revolutionizing insect pest control by developing biopesticides that help manage populations of the corn earworm and other destructive lepidopteran pests. The company'ss biopesticides are designed to be safe, effective, species-specific and easy to use.
Need More Acres Farm is a Kentucky-based farm and regional food hub connecting locally grown food with healthcare systems, schools and community partners through Food is Medicine, Farm to School and home delivery programs. Additionally, the farm's Food is Medicine work integrates clinical referrals and participant data collection, allowing healthcare partners to prescribe local produce and track outcomes.
Pascal Tags is adapting its proven Barcode 2.0™ platform — already deployed with customers that include GE Appliances and the Defense Logistics Agency — for agricultural applications, replacing failure-prone paper records and traditional barcodes with durable, automated asset tracking for farm inputs, harvested products and reusable agricultural equipment.
Silver Fern is a software company based in Lexington, Kentucky, that helps greenhouse and nursery growers forecast demand, plan production and fulfill orders. Silver Fern will utilize the Challenge Grant funds to support RESTOCK, its AI demand-forecasting module, which uses machine learning to predict store-level plant demand and cut the losses that come from narrow, weather-dependent selling windows.
Sunnyside Egg Co. is scaling regenerative, mobile egg production to give Kentucky farmers a lower-cost path into pasture-raised eggs. These grant funds will support the expansion of the company’s packing facility, as well as increasing production to 45,000 hens and the development of carbon credit software.