Pycno
Pycno (Pycno Industries, Inc.) sells all-in-one, solar-powered IoT soil and weather sensors and a cloud analytics platform to commercial growers, farm managers, and agronomists worldwide, monetizing hardware, SaaS subscriptions, and M2M connectivity.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2014
- HeadquartersValencia, Spain
- Headcount1–10
- GTM typeB2B
- OfferingHardware or Manufacturing
What Pycno does
Pycno Industries, Inc. designs, manufactures, and sells an integrated IoT agricultural sensing system aimed at commercial growers, farm managers, agronomists, and a smaller set of distributors and developer-integrators. The core hardware is an all-in-one, solar-powered sensor node that bundles capacitive soil-moisture sensing at 20 cm and 40 cm depths, soil and air temperature, air humidity, and solar irradiance with a built-in cellular SIM and a 3490 mAh internal battery. A Master variant acts as a roaming cellular gateway for a cluster of Node sensors that communicate over LoRa at 868–915 MHz with up to 800 m line-of-sight range, enabling a single SIM to cover an entire field. The product family also includes the Pycno Pulse and Pycno SKY lines, all running Pycno firmware.
Sensor data feeds Pycno Cloud, a hosted analytics platform that aggregates readings across multiple fields, overlays data from local weather stations and satellite services, and applies phenological and disease models to calculate growing degree days, chilling hours, irrigation recommendations, heatmaps, and rule-based alerts. A public NGSI-V2 REST API, token authentication, and a developer portal aligned with the FIWARE Orion Context Broker enable third-party "Powered by Pycno" integrations. Pycno earns revenue through one-time hardware sales via its get.pycno.co e-commerce storefront, monthly or annual Premium SaaS subscriptions (with a free Freemium tier), and usage-based M2M data pass-through for the built-in SIM. Distribution is multi-channel: direct-to-consumer e-commerce, a global distributor/reseller program with multi-region SIM management dashboards, and developer-led API adoption. The company is privately held, US-incorporated under California law, was founded in the UK in 2014, and reports installations in over 30 countries with built-in SIM coverage spanning over 160 countries.
Pycno firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- Pycno
- Legal name
- Pycno Industries, Inc.
- Website
- https://pycno.co
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2014
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 1–10 employees
- Short description
- Pycno (Pycno Industries, Inc.) sells all-in-one, solar-powered IoT soil and weather sensors and a cloud analytics platform to commercial growers, farm managers, and agronomists worldwide, monetizing hardware, SaaS subscriptions, and M2M connectivity.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Pycno industry classification
Industry- Product category
- Precision Agriculture Sensors
- NAICS
- Lawn and Garden Equipment and Supplies Retailers (4442)
- SIC
- Farm Machinery & Equipment (3523)
- akta.pro primary industry
- IoT Farm Sensors & Edge Devices (Soil, Weather, Crop, Water) (AFAAAFAC)
Keywords
Where Pycno is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- Valencia
- HQ country
- Spain
- HQ region
- Europe
Offices1 record
Markets served
Pycno business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2B
- Offering type
- Hardware or Manufacturing
- Cost components
- Technology or R&D, Supply Chain, Personnel, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure
Revenue model
- Hardware sales (sensor kits): One-time revenue from selling Pycno soil/weather sensor kits direct-to-consumer through the get.pycno.co storefront. Kits include the Master and/or Node sensors with built-in SIM.
- Freemium / Premium SaaS subscription for the Pycno Cloud platform: Two account tiers: a free Freemium Account with a limited number of Events and Devices, and a paid Premium Account. Users pay a monthly or annual Service Subscription Fee that auto-renews until cancelled. The pricing page at www.pycno.co/pricing governs the applicable fees, and additional Devices or Events are billed pro rata.
- Freemium tier (limited free use): Free tier of the hosted IoT service with a capped number of Events per month and Devices, intended to drive adoption and land users who can later upgrade.
- M2M connectivity (SIM cards and data plans): Recurring revenue from SIM cards and data plans that provide cellular connectivity to the Master sensors. Pricing is on Pycno's pricing page and Pycno passes through Communications Provider charges; usage limits and overage apply.
Pricing tiers
| Model | Billing | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Freemium | Pay-as-you-go | Freemium Account - free limited use of the Pycno Cloud platform |
| Subscription | Monthly | Premium Account - paid subscription with higher usage limits and additional features |
| Subscription | Annual | Premium Account - annual option |
| Usage-based | Pay-as-you-go | M2M SIM / data plan pass-through |
Go-to-market motion4 records
Distribution channels4 records
Marketing channels8 records
Pycno product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Pycno sells plug-and-play agricultural IoT sensor kits (Master and Node soil/weather sensors with built-in roaming SIM and solar power) that connect to the Pycno Cloud analytics platform, which applies phenological and disease models, irrigation control and alerts, and exposes data through an NGSI-V2 API. The offering is sold direct-to-consumer online, through distributors, and via developer integrations, targeting commercial growers, farm managers and agronomists worldwide.
Product overview
Pycno's offering is a tightly integrated hardware-plus-software platform for data-driven agriculture, anchored by three named physical product lines — the Pycno soil sensor (available in Master and Node variants), Pycno Pulse, and Pycno SKY — all running Pycno firmware and feeding data into the Pycno IoT Sensors Software Platform (the cloud dashboard). Master sensors include a built-in Pycno Global SIM and act as cellular gateways, while Node sensors relay readings to a nearby Master over LoRa, forming a self-organising farm network. The cloud platform layers on phenological and disease models, growing degree days, chilling hours, rule-based alerts, irrigation control, and heatmaps. Programmatic access is provided by the Pycno Developer API (NGSI-V2), and the Pycno Global SIM is sold as a bundled connectivity service that supports the hardware in over 160 countries.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Brands
- Pycno Pulse: Branded product line marketed by Pycno as part of its IoT sensor and connectivity portfolio.
- Pycno SKY
Products and services
- Pycno soil sensor (Master and Node variants) All-in-one agricultural IoT sensor that measures soil moisture (capacitive, at 20 cm and 40 cm depths), soil temperature, air temperature, air humidity, solar irradiance, and battery voltage. The Master variant includes a built-in roaming SIM and acts as the cellular gateway; the Node variant communicates with the Master over LoRa (868–915 MHz) at up to 800 m line-of-sight. Sensors are solar-powered (2 W monocrystalline panel) with a 3490 mAh internal battery.
- Pycno Pulse One of Pycno's physical products explicitly listed in the Privacy Policy as part of the Pycno product family; bundled with Pycno-provided firmware and integrated with the Pycno Cloud.
- Pycno SKY One of Pycno's physical products explicitly listed in the Privacy Policy as part of the Pycno product family; bundled with Pycno-provided firmware and integrated with the Pycno Cloud.
- Pycno IoT Sensors Software Platform (cloud dashboard) Cloud-based analytics platform that aggregates data from Pycno sensors and (separately) from local weather stations and satellite feeds. Features include irrigation control, advanced mapping and heatmaps, growing degree days and chilling hours, weather forecast, rule-based alerts, and phenological and disease models. Users can export data to spreadsheet and share access with their agronomist.
- Pycno Developer API (NGSI-V2) Public REST API at /api/ngsi-v2/* that exposes sensor readings and metadata in the FIWARE NGSI-V2 context information format. Token-based authentication via X-Auth-Token header or URL parameter. Supports reading sensor context and individual attributes, and (on request) uploading data from third-party sensors into the Pycno dashboard. HTTPS is mandatory.
- Pycno Global SIM (M2M connectivity) Roaming M2M SIM card pre-installed in every Master sensor. Operates over third-party 2G, 3G (UMTS) and 4G/LTE networks in over 160 countries, with no contracts or renewals. SIM cost is bundled into the user's selected Pycno service plan, and distributors can commission/decommission SIMs centrally via the dashboard.
Quantifiable outcome
- 70% average reduction in irrigation water use in the documented Spanish pumpkin/melon/watermelon case study
- +3 more outcomes
Companies that use Pycno
Customer profileNamed customers1 record
Segments4 records
Ideal customer profiles3 records
Pycno technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- Yes
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Integration5 records
AI capability5 records
Feature8 records
Pycno partnerships and signals
Strategic signalPartnerships
Four partnerships are on record, tiered core.
- FIWARE (FIWARE Orion Context Broker)corePycno's developer portal references FIWARE (https://fiware-orion.readthedocs.io/en/develop/user/walkthrough_apiv2/#query-entity) and displays the FIWARE logo, and the Pycno API uses the NGSI-V2 standard that FIWARE Orion implements. This indicates API-level alignment with the FIWARE ecosystem rather than a formal commercial partnership.
- Wireless Communications Provider (M2M/Communications Network)coreUnder the Supplemental Terms for SIM Cards, Pycno relies on a third-party Communications Provider (and its Affiliates and Roaming Partners) to provide the Wireless Communications Services / M2M Services used by Master sensors. Pycno passes through Communications Provider fees to the customer. The specific provider is not named publicly.
- Third-party servers (Pycno Cloud / data hosting)corePycno stores data collected via its Websites and Services on "secure third-party servers" (including in the United States for M2M processing) and may also use third parties to process or analyze collected data. The specific cloud provider is not named.
- Distributors of Pycno SensorscorePycno invites prospective distributors that have multiple deployments in multiple regions to manage SIMs and sensor commissioning/decommissioning from their dashboard, encapsulating multi-region fleet management in one place.
Scale indicators6 records
Recent moves6 records
Expansion highlights5 records
Pycno competitors and assessment
Company assessmentDirect peers
- CropX: CropX sells soil moisture and irrigation intelligence sensors with a cloud analytics platform to commercial growers — the closest direct competitor to Pycno's all-in-one sensor + SaaS offering, targeting the same SMB/agronomist buyer with similar hardware-plus-software economics.
- Pessl Instruments (METOS): METOS by Pessl offers field weather stations, soil moisture sensors and disease models globally, competing with Pycno on multi-parameter field sensors plus analytics for growers and agribusinesses.
- Meter Group (formerly Decagon Devices): Meter Group produces research- and agriculture-grade soil moisture and environmental sensors (e.g., TEROS, ATMOS), overlapping with Pycno on capacitive soil sensing hardware and is frequently compared in ag-tech procurement.
- Semios: Semios provides in-orchard and field IoT sensors combined with pest, disease and weather analytics for specialty crop growers, overlapping directly with Pycno's phenological/disease modeling and per-field sensor network approach.
- Arable: Arable builds all-in-one ag weather and crop sensors with a cloud analytics dashboard, closely mirroring Pycno's 'Measure, Analyse, Take action' positioning and pricing model for agribusiness and agronomy customers.
- Sentek: Sentek manufactures soil moisture and salinity probes with telemetry options, addressing the same precision-irrigation use case as Pycno's capacitive soil sensors with recurring data services.
Broad incumbents
- John Deere (Climate FieldView): John Deere's Climate FieldView is a broad farm-management platform that ingests sensor and agronomic data at scale. While not a single-field sensor vendor, it competes for the same grower wallet share and is the dominant incumbent Pycno must position against in precision agriculture.
- Davis Instruments: Davis Instruments is an established weather-station and environmental sensor vendor with a long-standing dealer channel and recurring data subscriptions, broadly overlapping Pycno's ag weather and soil-monitoring value proposition.
Emerging players
- Taranis: Taranis combines aerial imagery, AI-driven scouting and field-level analytics for growers and ag retailers. It is adjacent rather than directly competitive, but competes for the analytics/decision-support budget that Pycno targets with its disease and insect models.
- AquaSpy: AquaSpy sells multi-depth soil moisture and salinity probes for irrigation management, addressing a subset of Pycno's soil-moisture use case at greater depth granularity and serving a similar commercial-grower base.
Market position
Strengths4 records
Weaknesses4 records
Competitive moat5 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights6 records
Customer concentration
Pycno social profiles
Digital presencePycno compliance and trust
Trust signalCompliance2 records
Pycno financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
Pycno leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles3 records
Pycno funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds7 records
Investors9 records
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Pycno M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Frequently asked questions about Pycno
What does Pycno do?
Pycno sells plug-and-play agricultural IoT sensor kits (Master and Node soil/weather sensors with built-in roaming SIM and solar power) that connect to the Pycno Cloud analytics platform, which applies phenological and disease models, irrigation control and alerts, and exposes data through an NGSI-V2 API. The offering is sold direct-to-consumer online, through distributors, and via developer integrations, targeting commercial growers, farm managers and agronomists worldwide.
Is Pycno a public or private company?
Pycno is a private company. It is classified as venture growth investor backed and is currently operating.
When was Pycno founded?
Pycno was founded in 2014. It employs 1 to 10 people.
Where is Pycno based?
Pycno is headquartered in Valencia, Spain, in the Europe region.
How does Pycno make money?
Four revenue lines are on record. Hardware sales (sensor kits) is the primary driver. The others are freemium / Premium SaaS subscription for the Pycno Cloud platform, freemium tier (limited free use) and M2M connectivity (SIM cards and data plans).
Who are Pycno's main competitors?
Direct peers on record are CropX, Pessl Instruments (METOS), Meter Group (formerly Decagon Devices), Semios, Arable and Sentek. Broad incumbents are John Deere (Climate FieldView) and Davis Instruments. Emerging players are Taranis and AquaSpy.
Does Pycno have an API?
Yes. Pycno exposes a public REST-style API at /api/ngsi-v2/* endpoints, conforming to the FIWARE NGSI-V2 context information standard. Developers can programmatically obtain sensor data (Temperature, Humidity, Solar radiation, Soil at 20cm and 40cm, Soil temperature, battery voltage, Signal strength) from the Pycno server. Authentication is via a token issued in the user's account settings, passed either as a URL parameter or in the X-Auth-Token HTTP header. HTTPS is mandatory for any sensitive information. The API supports both individual sensor queries and specific attribute queries (e.g., GET a sensor's full context or a single attribute). The API also supports uploading data from third-party sensors to the Pycno dashboard (by contacting Pycno). Developer documentation is at pycno.co/developers.
What industry is Pycno in?
Pycno's product category is Precision Agriculture Sensors. Its primary akta.pro industry code is AFAAAFAC, IoT Farm Sensors & Edge Devices (Soil, Weather, Crop, Water). Its NAICS code is 4442 and its SIC code is 3523.