Food as Medicine: Inside a Robotic Vertical Farm Growing Nutrients
Apollo Farms co-founder Sam Bertram joins Louisa Nicola to explain how robotic vertical farms grow ultra-nutrient-dense plants with no soil or sun. He lays out why rival farms collapsed, how tuning light and nutrients boosts micronutrients, and his bigger vision: growing off-patent medicines inside plants and designing food around your own biology.
Overview
In this hour-long conversation on TNE with Louisa Nicola, Apollo Farms co-founder Sam Bertram explains how indoor, robotic vertical farming could reshape both nutrition and medicine. He opens with why so many better-funded competitors collapsed, and how his company survived by cutting its monthly burn from $2 million to $200,000 rather than scaling prematurely.
The founders' mission, he says, crystallised around a single statistic — 1.1 billion people began the millennium malnourished — and a conviction that micronutrient deficiency is the world's most underrated killer. He describes Apollo Farms as 'a box that grows plants to their highest potential,' where light, water timing and nutrient mixes are tuned to raise the density of specific micronutrients. On the biology side, he walks through how a plant thrives with no soil and no sun, and how a partnership with warehouse-robotics firm Auto Store finally made the unit economics work.
The most provocative stretch turns to medicine: growing off-patent molecules — even monoclonal antibodies — inside plants at a fraction of today's cost, all under existing regulatory oversight. Throughout, he returns to a simple theme: feed the body real, nutrient-dense food and it handles far more than we assume. The episode closes with a live tasting of microgreens, kale and beet greens. As always, this is educational wellness content, not medical advice.
Key quotes
5Everyone gets cancer five times a day. Your body knows how to take care of it.
Humans need nutrients. I want to grow those nutrients. Humans need medicinal molecules. I want to grow those medicinal molecules.
It costs them $50 million to build these facilities and it's a 25-year payback period. That is not economically feasible.
I will manufacture that at such a low cost that anyone in the world who needs it can get it.
I did not exercise at all for about eight years. What happened to my body? Nothing. You know what I did? I ate well.
Key ideas
8Survival by shrinking, not scaling
While rivals like Bowery, AeroFarms and Plenty burned tens of millions a month, Apollo Farms cut its burn from $2 million to $200,000 and stayed 'gritty.' Turning a small ship, he argues, is far easier than turning a huge one.
The number that set the mission
Reading that 1.1 billion people began the millennium malnourished redirected the founders away from 'sexy' problems. They concluded the biggest killer is micronutrient deficiency — the body's 'plumbing and wiring' going unfed.
Plants as molecular manufacturers
The stated goal is to grow both nutrients and medicinal molecules, positioning plants as the 'molecular manufacturer of the world.' Deep-learning tools map protein folds; the farm aims to produce the molecules.
Training a plant to express itself
Starting from fixed genetics, growers tune light, dehydration and nutrient mixes to change what a plant builds — a UV blast or an iron-rich feed can sharply raise a target nutrient. This control, he says, is only possible indoors.
Thriving with no soil and no sun
Seeds start in upcycled coconut-husk media, then are hydrated to 'wake up' and send out roots and true leaves. Plants are gravitropic and phototropic, so precise water composition and light wavelengths guide healthy growth.
The unit-economics code they cracked
A partnership with warehouse-robotics firm Auto Store slashed build cost and lifted growing density about 30%. Smart siting in low-cost-power states (13 cents/kWh vs 30+) turned unprofitable math into a workable model.
Food tuned to your biology
The long-term vision is to read a person's data — even a blood test — and grow food matched to their deficiencies. He repeatedly cautions that human and plant biology are 'unbelievably complex,' so this is a direction, not a finished product.
Off-patent medicines grown in plants
Using plant systems, he claims safe, effective, off-patent molecules — including monoclonal antibodies grown with UC Davis — could be manufactured far more cheaply than in mammalian cells, still under FDA oversight.
Practical takeaways
6- 1
Nutrient density can be engineered 24:00
How a plant is grown — its light, water and timing — shapes its nutrient profile, not just its genetics.
- 2
Fresh and clean can beat washing 33:00
He recommends not washing their greens, arguing careful indoor growing leaves them cleaner than rinsing would; always follow product guidance for your own produce.
- 3
Shop the perimeter for live food 1:01:00
He suggests focusing on the fresh outer aisles — real, living food — rather than the chain you shop at.
- 4
Light is fuel — amount and wavelength matter 44:00
Indoor plants get 16-18 hours of tuned light versus roughly 8 outdoors, and different wavelengths (UV, IR) trigger different compounds.
- 5
Nutrition is the foundation 55:30
His own eight-year story frames eating well as fuelling the engine — important alongside, not instead of, sleep and exercise.
- 6
A fed body is resilient 1:00:00
He describes the body as constantly clearing threats when well-nourished, underscoring consistent, real-food eating for most people.
Topics & chapters
14Feeding and dosing humanity
A montage on plants, medicine and the promise that everyone could 'live an optimal nutritional life.'
Why the giant vertical farms collapsed
Cash burn, waterborne pathogens and broken promises that sank far better-funded competitors.
The promise that kept them alive
A vow to investors, firing 80 friends, and buying two more years from the board.
1.1 billion malnourished
The number that pulled the founders toward micronutrient deficiency as the world's biggest problem.
What Apollo Farms actually is
A box that grows plants to their potential with robots, LEDs and controlled conditions — and why indoors.
Training the plant, closing the loop
Tuning nutrient expression, the vision of your own farm, and 300 of 30,000 edible species.
Growing with no soil or sun
Coconut-husk media, waking the seed, roots and leaves, and hydroponics over aeroponics.
Robots, safety and pesticides
Auto Store's grid, the humans still needed, food-safety testing, and the case on washing and pesticides.
Why they survived: unit economics
Build cost, reliability, density and low-cost-power placement — the code competitors couldn't crack.
Light as fuel
16-18 hours of intense light, UVB before harvest, wavelength recipes, and parallels to red-light therapy.
Food designed for your body
Blood-test-matched nutrition, food as medicine, and his own mysterious years of exercise intolerance.
Growing pharmaceuticals in plants
Monoclonal antibodies, off-patent molecules, UC Davis, and who regulates 'fed and dosed.'
Cancer, money printing and prices
Why the body clears threats when fed, and why good food has become so expensive.
The tasting
Microgreens, bok choy, mizuna, kale and beet greens — and the $4.49 truth about taste.