4 ms·

So, why would the farmer use it then?

est31 6y ago
For now it's fueled by VC cash so people will adopt it because of it. This gives Tillable growth numbers that impress investors to give even more money and so on, until it's so large that it can apply ideas of scale, like integrating vertically in some form. The vertical integration Uber envisions is self driving cars. Any company which has a foot in the hauling market will have an advantage over a purely self driving research company. The vertical integration of Tillable would involve things like buying the land, renting out machines, completely automating the work, etc. Something like that.
luckylion 6y ago
Because he needs land to farm on, or he stops being a farmer and has to shut down his business. He will now pay e.g. $1000. Tillable will offer $1100 upfront to the land owner and then "offer" it to the farmer for the low price of $1200. Since he can't just farm on some piece of land 500 miles away, he can either pay the new price, or stop farming. Tillable offers no significant service here. It's not that there's a lot of land sitting idle because farmers and land owners have no way to come in contact, they are not solving a problem, they are just injecting themselves to extract rent with VC money.
- EdwardDiego 6y ago
  Bingo. It's literal rent seeking.
- PeterisP 6y ago
  If the farmer is willing to accept a $1200 price, then what prevents the land owner from charging $1200 right now? All the factors you list which push the price up apply just as well for the current owner-renter negotiations. The scenario you describe is possible only if there is a lot of land that's severely mispriced / underpriced - in which case the price should and would get corrected, and after that the arbitrage opportunity disappears because, as you say, the land owner can come in contact directly with the farmer and make arrangements.
  - TeMPOraL 6y ago
    > If the farmer is willing to accept a $1200 price, then what prevents the land owner from charging $1200 right now? Basic human decency? These are often long-term relationships between neighbours, whose families lived next to each other for decades or hundreds of years.
    - randomdata 6y ago
      But those with such decency wouldn't turn to Tillable to capture an extra buck, so it remains unclear where you think Tillable fits.
      - luckylion 6y ago
        Apparently nobody turns to Tillable. It's Tillable that's turning to land owners and tries to convince them to not renew their contracts with farmers so Tillable can negotiate new contracts with higher prices, likely with the same farmers (as farming is very much a local thing, you can't farm a piece of land from a thousand miles away).
        randomdata 6y ago
        That only brings us back to the question of why landowners wouldn't go directly to the farmer and ask for the hypothetical $1,200 that Tillable would also ask of them? It is not exactly difficult to figure out who the farmers are in your local area, and it is especially not very difficult to figure out which ones are the hungry ones willing to pay top dollar, if that is your goal. Chances are they have already been hounding you for years. Exactly because people don't normally seek farmland a thousand miles away, where there could potentially be a benefit in new introductions, it remains unclear where Tillable fits.
        TeMPOraL 6y ago
        And that brings us back to my original answer: why would they? Trying to extract maximum profit from the counterparty is adversarial, whereas a relationship between a land owner and a neighbourhood farmer most likely is cooperative. EDIT: for the same reason, I don't think Tillable has a chance of working, and to the extent it does, it's actively destructive.

For now it's fueled by VC cash so people will adopt it because of it. This gives Tillable growth numbers that impress investors to give even more money and so on, until it's so large that it can apply ideas of scale, like integrating vertically in some form. The vertical integration Uber envisions is self driving cars. Any company which has a foot in the hauling market will have an advantage over a purely self driving research company. The vertical integration of Tillable would involve things like buying the land, renting out machines, completely automating the work, etc. Something like that.

luckylion 6y ago

Because he needs land to farm on, or he stops being a farmer and has to shut down his business. He will now pay e.g. $1000. Tillable will offer $1100 upfront to the land owner and then "offer" it to the farmer for the low price of $1200. Since he can't just farm on some piece of land 500 miles away, he can either pay the new price, or stop farming. Tillable offers no significant service here. It's not that there's a lot of land sitting idle because farmers and land owners have no way to come in contact, they are not solving a problem, they are just injecting themselves to extract rent with VC money.

EdwardDiego 6y ago
Bingo. It's literal rent seeking.
PeterisP 6y ago
If the farmer is willing to accept a $1200 price, then what prevents the land owner from charging $1200 right now? All the factors you list which push the price up apply just as well for the current owner-renter negotiations. The scenario you describe is possible only if there is a lot of land that's severely mispriced / underpriced - in which case the price should and would get corrected, and after that the arbitrage opportunity disappears because, as you say, the land owner can come in contact directly with the farmer and make arrangements.
- TeMPOraL 6y ago
  > If the farmer is willing to accept a $1200 price, then what prevents the land owner from charging $1200 right now? Basic human decency? These are often long-term relationships between neighbours, whose families lived next to each other for decades or hundreds of years.
  - randomdata 6y ago
    But those with such decency wouldn't turn to Tillable to capture an extra buck, so it remains unclear where you think Tillable fits.
    - luckylion 6y ago
      Apparently nobody turns to Tillable. It's Tillable that's turning to land owners and tries to convince them to not renew their contracts with farmers so Tillable can negotiate new contracts with higher prices, likely with the same farmers (as farming is very much a local thing, you can't farm a piece of land from a thousand miles away).
      - randomdata 6y ago
        That only brings us back to the question of why landowners wouldn't go directly to the farmer and ask for the hypothetical $1,200 that Tillable would also ask of them? It is not exactly difficult to figure out who the farmers are in your local area, and it is especially not very difficult to figure out which ones are the hungry ones willing to pay top dollar, if that is your goal. Chances are they have already been hounding you for years. Exactly because people don't normally seek farmland a thousand miles away, where there could potentially be a benefit in new introductions, it remains unclear where Tillable fits.
        TeMPOraL 6y ago
        And that brings us back to my original answer: why would they? Trying to extract maximum profit from the counterparty is adversarial, whereas a relationship between a land owner and a neighbourhood farmer most likely is cooperative. EDIT: for the same reason, I don't think Tillable has a chance of working, and to the extent it does, it's actively destructive.