A Longmont developer of autonomous commercial lawn mowers will get an incentive offer from the state of Colorado to expand its production facility.
Scythe Robotics Inc., confirmed to BizWest this week that the Colorado Economic Development Commission signed off on the offer of $372,000 over five years from its strategic fund to convince the company to choose Longmont for its planned 50,000-square-foot manufacturing site.
The commission does not identify companies that the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade is recruiting until incentives are accepted.
A spokesman representing Scythe Robotics later confirmed to BizWest that the company was targeted for the incentive offer.
Scythe is the creator of an autonomous mower that uses eight HDR cameras and a suite of sensors to detect and avoid people, animals and other obstacles. The company has 37 employees, 28 of whom are in Colorado, and expects to create 394 net new jobs at an average annual wage of $116,881, according to OEDIT documents. New positions will include engineers, manufacturers, and roles in sales and operations, according to BizWest.
The incentive package is contingent upon a local match by Longmont, the Longmont Economic Development Partnership or other community partners, BizWest states.
Project Eldorado — the name Scythe used on its application to the commission — must boost its production capacity to reduce its order backlog, which stretches into 2025, a company representative now confirmed to be Scythe vice president of finance Leo Jiang told the EDC last week.
“There’s a lot of interest out there for something brand new in the industry,” he said, according to BizWest.
Scythe also is considering Florida and Texas for its manufacturing facility.
